


Patpong

by drinkbloodlikewine, whiskeyandspite



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Blood, Cannibalism, Dubious Consent, Dubious Morality, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Happy Ending, Flashbacks, Fluff, Graphic Violence, Hero Worship, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, M/M, Nightmares, PTSD, Sex Trafficking, Slow Burn, child sex trade, graphic killing, heavy underage, implied child abduction, leon the professional au, saga-length
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-26
Updated: 2015-10-23
Packaged: 2018-04-06 04:58:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 20
Words: 76,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4208799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drinkbloodlikewine/pseuds/drinkbloodlikewine, https://archiveofourown.org/users/whiskeyandspite/pseuds/whiskeyandspite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Through the red light district, shined shoes find familiar thoroughfares, between buildings here, down a sidestreet there, until the genders of those on display blend as the neon against the ill-lit sky, a static grey neither light nor dark. And past those indiscernables, who call to him and beckon, to the bent road Soi Pratuchai. It is strangely appropriate that this portion of Patpong is curved - indeed, few enough in it could be called straight.</i>
</p><p>Hannibal is a lone predator hunting in the deep bowels of a very corrupt city. Will just wants to be found.</p><p><b>PLEASE READ ALL THE TAGS AND NOTES BEFORE YOU BEGIN!!!</b> This fic contains some very sensitive material.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GulliverJ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GulliverJ/gifts).



> This is not the typical rent-boy fic. This is a look into the darker side of that territory, and it is frightening. There is no abuse between the main characters, and no non-con/dub-con between them. However, please be aware that while we use the setting for a story, things like this happen every day, and there are many people undercover working to free children and women and young men from this slavery.
> 
> This story does have a happy ending.
> 
> For the lovely [GulliverJ](http://brokenponiesmendedteacups.tumblr.com/), who not only inspires us everyday, but requested something of a similar ilk perhaps a month ago. We hope you enjoy it, Jos, you are wonderful.
> 
> This work has been beta'd by the extraordinary [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/). We couldn't do this without you.

Patpong has been kind to Hannibal.

While during daylight hours the country is his to tour, visiting shrines buried in primeval forest, glistening ivory beaches, achingly beautiful mountains with peaks obscured by shifting mist, at night he is here. Among throngs of rancid humanity, fat tourists bellowing drunk at bored local women with one hand in their mark’s pocket, among fetid smoke that smears neon into impressionist swaths of color, he is strangely safe. He is unremarkable. He dresses in dark suits, nothing particularly identifiable, and certainly little to distinguish him from any other foreigner come to Thailand in the name of business and in pursuit of pleasure.

The thud of Nana Plaza’s ceaseless party sets a pace by which to time his heart - not each beat of bass, but every fourth. He counts, glancing through smog-smudged windows to the flashes of flesh within - boucherie of a different sort, and really just the same. He winds through Soi Cowboy, stepping aside to let pass a handful of lads - London, or near enough, if their accents are anything to go by - stagger past him with almost childish pleasure in their grins.

He does not follow them. Their pursuits are not his own.

Through the red light district, shined shoes find familiar thoroughfares, between buildings here, down a sidestreet there, until the genders of those on display blend as the neon against the ill-lit sky, a static grey neither light nor dark. And past those indiscernables, who call to him and beckon, to the bent road Soi Pratuchai. It is strangely appropriate that this portion of Patpong is curved - indeed, few enough in it could be called straight.

Hannibal’s slight smile is caught within an instant, by a proprietor at his side, a heavy-set man who takes in Hannibal’s suit and bag as readily as he does his face. The question is all too familiar:

“You want company?”

He ducks his head as though in doubt, in consideration, and regards the man, feigning hesitation. Hannibal sends a look over his shoulder, as much as to ensure no pickpocket has stepped up behind him, as to affect a particular wariness that a man like himself should have here. His prey is before him, now, with greed shining in his eyes.

But one must play the game. It would be very poor form indeed for the quarry to flee.

“Young,” Hannibal says, and meets the man’s eyes meaningfully.

The grin is wide, teeth crooked, some missing, and breath rancid, and Hannibal resists the urge to turn his head where it shouldn’t turn, hear the crisp snap of cartilage and bone. He will have time. It is always better if he takes it.

“Girl?” the man asks, damn near salivating thinking of his own product. “Many ages, from very little to just growing into their lovely bodies. All clean, always clean.”

Hannibal highly doubts the promise, but he shakes his head for a different reason. The man blinks, reconsiders, takes in Hannibal once more and this smile draws his piggish eyes more narrow, the bottom lids twitching as he tries to draw out the intrigue of a guaranteed sale.

“Boy?”

“Boy,” Hannibal confirms, does not repeat his previous demand, he’s fairly certain the man doesn't have anyone other than ‘young’.

“Right place for boys,” the man assures him. “Six boys. So pretty. Do you want to choose? See before you buy? I sell for nights, then they come back.”

“Six?” Hannibal asks, brows lifting. His surprise does not have to be falsified - it’s more than Hannibal expected from the man whose movements he’s tracked for several days, marking his paths and the times he takes them, certain of the nature of his business but not the scope of it. Normally Hannibal can expect one or two of each, rarely more than that.

“Six,” the man repeats, happily conversant in Thai when Hannibal speaks it to him, and Hannibal happy to be perceived as a higher class of businessman. One actually here for that purpose, rather than depravity. A nervous curiosity drawing him inward towards the roiling red underbelly of the city.

He is not perceived as police. All the better, since he is not.

“Come in and see them, come with me,” the proprietor insists, bustling Hannibal onward, not to the front door where music squeals and pulses, where women, men, and those in-between dance or display themselves. He takes Hannibal down an alley, and when Hannibal pauses, insists, “It’s safe.”

Hannibal allows a faint smile. It is far safer for him than for anyone.

“I trust you,” he responds, and follows to the back entrance.

The music is muffled but not by much, and stairs carpeted in an array of old paisley and faded check lead up to the apartment above the club. The door has several locks but the man just moves them, no key necessary. Perhaps a precaution against thieves and curious tweakers, perhaps just left unlocked for business hours.

Hannibal is ushered inside, the door closed behind him to muffle the music further, though the bass still vibrates through the floor and up into Hannibal’s bones. He just nods when the man gestures onwards. The apartment is not large, opening directly to a wide living area crammed with sagging couches and folding chairs. A television blares in the corner but the sound mingles with the music enough to be entirely unimportant. On the screen some rapper gesticulates as women circle him.

Beverly Hills. Land of milk and honey.

Hannibal is led to a small corridor, to a door with another lock. Across from it stands another, door ajar, a bed within made up in dark sheets. To take the chosen merchandise, apparently. Hannibal's lip twitches in disgust but he says nothing. He waits.

The door before him is unlocked, and there is a frantic scrabbling behind it as the boys kept there return to where they should be. To their cots and bunks. Away from the door. Away from the creaking, tiny window.

A fan is going but it is still stifling. A board game lies scattered on the floor, surrounded by clothes and assorted underwear and toys. There are, as promised, six boys. Two very little, three a little older, and one asleep, back turned, too exhausted or too sick to even move when he’s barked at to come over.

Hannibal's eyes skim the selection, all frightened, all little. Asian features and dark skin and one, just one boy, with eyes bright blue and skin pale. He holds one of the smallest against him, arms protectively around his middle, but moves to obey the yelled instructions as the others do.

He does not avert his gaze. Though his pulse keeps time with the music now, allowed to quicken and spill electric adrenaline through his muscles, Hannibal does not look away from the boys who will not spend another night locked in this room. They stand still before him, nothing left enough to even make them tremble.

Numb.

Frozen.

Hannibal knows the feeling, all too well, and the bead of sweat from the room’s suffocating humidity reminds him that he is not that little boy anymore. Each in turn is studied, surveyed as if with prurient interest rather than a practical count for each that will need to be deposited somewhere safe. And with a hum, Hannibal’s attention lingers for a beat longer, on the blue-eyed boy, standing taller than the rest.

He turns back towards the hallway, lip curling as he skims his tongue along his teeth, and as the proprietor follows in ready dismay, Hannibal offers a faint smile. “I want them.”

“Yes, pick one and he’s yours - all night,” the man insists, motioning to the dismal bedroom. “You can stay.”

“No,” Hannibal breathes, almost a laugh, and he sets a hand on the man’s shoulder. Both angle away from the boys, and Hannibal takes a step towards the bedroom. Another. “My Thai is not very good.”

“It’s excellent,” the man insists, and Hannibal rewards him with a wan smile.

“I want all of them.”

“All - all six? It’s too many.”

“Is it?”

“Yes,” the man insists with a brash laugh, patting Hannibal’s stomach. “You’re a strong man, but six -”

“All of them,” Hannibal says again, and in a movement too fast for the man to do little more than draw a breath, he steps behind him. One hand atop his head, the other beneath his chin, a jerk one way, and then the other, and cartilage crackles like frying oil, bones popping like firecrackers.

The proprietor falls heavy to the ground, and Hannibal steps back only enough to free his shoes from beneath him, before looking to the oldest boys. “Where are the others?”

The blue-eyed boy blinks, clearly understanding, a long time since he has heard English here - few tourists come down this far unless they know what they want and where to go for it cheaper - but says nothing. He holds the younger boy to his chest a little harder, lets him turn for comfort into him and just stares.

Hannibal looks at him long enough for the boy to swallow, jaw working, but still no words. And he knows that too, that bone-deep chain that holds everything inside, sounds and words and feelings, everything they have already taken and what they want more of. It’s a defiance and a strength. Hannibal asks him again.

“The others. The girls. Where are they?”

Still the boy is silent, eyes wide and almost frozen where he stands, before something, some strange tug of trust or hope pulls his muscles enough to move and he lifts his hand to point, back to the door of the apartment.

“Downstairs,” he whispers. “They work.”

It is all much more than Hannibal anticipated. A fit of pique, to kill the man in front of them. Certain that the boy now watching him with baleful mistrust did not speak English. Hannibal imagined - and still does, in truth - that for as much as he needed to see his own captors killed, perhaps by saving these boys the trouble of doing it themselves later, they could sleep easier, now, knowing he’s gone.

And yet, in a city of so many - nameless, faceless - foreigners, what is one more amongst the throngs?

He works his lips together, pursed, and then speaks softly, clearly, without moving towards the room where the boys stand watching him, wide eyes shining in the dim light.

“Take them. Take the girls,” Hannibal instructs the blue-eyed boy. “If the one in bed is unwell, you will send the police here when you have brought the rest to them. The station is left from the door, one block. Do you understand?”

The boy looks at Hannibal, down to the man in the corridor, back to him again, still frozen, still unsure. Whatever fear had been instilled into these kids about leaving the apartment is enough to hold him motionless still. Numb. Scared. Slowly, he shakes his head, brows furrowed and up, pulse fluttering wild where Hannibal can see it against his throat.

He could curse in frustration.

He doesn’t.

He tries again.

“What’s his name?” He gestures to the boy turned against the other’s chest. He waits. Long enough for something to click for the blue-eyed one to reply.

“Jamal.”

“You’re holding him so he won’t be scared,” Hannibal says, watches the boy nod. “That’s very brave.”

Another blink, another flutter of a swallow, another flicker of eyes to the dead man and back to the man who killed him. In truth, not the best odds for a child terrified into staying in a filthy room unless he’s bought, but better than none at all.

“You are very brave,” Hannibal repeats, until the boy blinks and looks down at the little one trembling against him. “I need your help, because I know you can do it. I need you to take the boys to the station. And the girls, who you can find, downstairs. Send the police here.”

Another glance to the floor.

“He can’t hurt you anymore,” Hannibal assures him, and the boy’s eyes flick immediately to him at the words, a hatred behind them known only all too well, reeking of broken promises made already.

“Will you?” the boy asks him.

He does not patronize the boy with more a smile than the small one that appears despite himself, keeping distance from his eyes. There is no pleasure in it. No delight. Little enough comfort, because the man that offers it now is as familiar with the boy’s anger as he is his fear.

“No,” Hannibal answers. Only that. And he knows before the boy’s eyes even narrow that he is not believed. It doesn’t matter.

He does not wait. The boys will either go now or not. They will either take the girls, or Hannibal’s call to the station, spoken in near-native Thai, will ensure that they are found.

It doesn’t matter at all.

They are six, perhaps nine in total, out of thousands. They do not think of him with any more kindness than the dead man that Hannibal now hefts onto the bed, curling his sleeve around his wrist to pull the door closed behind him. Without another word, he turns to go, practicing already the particular dialect that will be used to make the call, and beyond that, considering where he will eat, tonight, now that he has been prevented from making the meal he intended.

His own fault, really. A fit of whimsy.

He is down the stairs and by the front of the club again, everything here unchanged, music still pulsing a headache through his skin, dancers still moving as though they have only energy for this, as though it is unending. Hannibal doesn’t meet eyes, he doesn’t care to. He wonders, for a moment, if he should go in, find a girl, find a few, and send them to the station instead. Perhaps they were not as terrified as the boys upstairs, perhaps they had more leeway to come and go, since they were not under lock and key.

He considers, nothing more.

They will or they won’t.

The police will come regardless.

Something catches against Hannibal’s sleeve, and he turns, a pivot on his heel, quick enough to see just little arms, up quick, covering a head of curly hair against a blow that doesn’t come. A moment, a breath, and the bruised arms lower, blue eyes wide and nervous beneath.

“Don’t call,” the boy says, voice quick, urgent. “Don’t call the police to come here. They come here already. They won’t help. They just -” The boy’s lips twist in a disgusted grimace and he swallows, turning back to the club to look, hands up against skinny arms as though to warm himself.

“I told the boys to go. Some have family here, they are from here. Others are just close. Some know the girls, they… they’ll tell. But -” The boy trembles, shifts his eyes up again, briefly, before looking away. He takes a step as Hannibal does, bird-quick and nervous, cheeks flushing with shame at the words he can’t voice.

Hannibal looks away from him, down the street one side, and then the other. His mouth works in thought. The boy is dressed, at least, ill-fitting pants and a t-shirt, dirty. Bare-footed. Hannibal’s studies not the boy himself when he looks back to him, but the bruises darkening pale skin. There is no question of the boy’s purpose in this area of the city - no doubt as to what he’s here for, forced or otherwise. And alongside a foreign businessman -

“Walk,” Hannibal tells him. “Just behind me, speak in English and follow. We will round the block, only.”

It looks bad. It is, for all intents and purposes, an unfortunate situation for Hannibal to find himself in. He turns away from the boy who watches wide-eyed, and resists a frown when he hears footsteps padding behind.

“If you go to them, they will return you home.”

“They won’t,” the boy insists. “Or they would have before.”

“The embassy, then. I can bring you there and leave you. The Americans would not turn you away.”

“I’m not American,” the boy says softly. There is just a grunt in reply, understanding, perhaps, displeasure, something, anything. The man walks and the boy follows, eyes darting back and forth as they move, closer and closer to getting to the corner, the end of the block and the end of any sort of guarantee the kid has.

“I don’t have a home here,” the boy whispers, desperate, the thickness of tears behind the words already and Hannibal stops, abruptly enough that the boy walks into him, staggers back in fear of retribution for it. He has been here long enough to have been frightened into responses. Don’t walk too close, don’t touch unless you’re told, don’t cry unless they want you to. Don’t ask. For anything.

“What do you want?” Hannibal asks him, and the boy nearly crumples from the question, cheeks red and eyes pressed closed tight before he swallows even that down and takes quick shallow breaths to right himself again.

“I don’t know.” It’s little, it’s so little that Hannibal barely hears him. The boy stands shaking, skinny enough to be malnourished, filthy, exhausted, bruised. Who knows what hell he’s been in, here, and for how long. At the very least he would need rest, without the constant bass beneath him to keep him awake day and night, he would need food, a bath, new clothes.

Not Hannibal’s problem.

He takes a step and the boy presses closer, a hand against his sleeve again, tight and quick. Scared. The fear trembling through from his core to every extremity. He swallows, once, twice, the sickened grimace back before he lifts his eyes and seeks Hannibal’s.

“I can - I can pay you back. They always liked my mouth, you can -” The revulsion is evident, so clear it radiates from the kid, but still he doesn’t let go. 

“Stop,” Hannibal says. “No.”

The words are firm enough to startle the boy, and Hannibal watches the flinch, the way his jaw tightens, braced to be struck - not because he thinks Hannibal will, but because he has no reason to think he will not. The older man’s eyes lift. If anyone has noticed them, they pay no mind. It is more likely, entirely more likely, that no one has noticed at all.

This isn’t his problem.

He returned here with the same intention that he returns here every time. To find the ones selling. To ensure they cannot continue. To take from them as they have taken from others, and leave them. There are few things that matter less, in certain parts of the world, than a scale scraped from the underbelly of the Leviathan. And while Hannibal does not delude himself to think it stops the sinuous, eternal coiling of the beast, it matters to those who are saved from its maw.

The boy watches him, awaiting his fate, and Hannibal knows that he would not survive a night alone, here, not without being taken again, and thrust back between ravenous teeth.

“Follow,” he says, and there is no pleasure in his words. He will need to know where the boy is from, if he remembers, he will need to know where to send him. He will have to hope that his good deed will be remembered as that, or find his flight from Thailand far faster than expected.

“You will go to the rear of the hotel. You cannot enter through the front as you are,” Hannibal instructs, brooking no question, no pause, firm decisions quickly spoken. “You will wait by the service entrance. I will come for you then.”

The boy nods brisk and relieved, eyes still so wide, lips parted as he takes in quick breaths of panic and anticipation. He goes as Hannibal does, lets go when the man gently peels his fingers off of him. He follows, obedient, walking from Soi Pratuchai, past more active clubs and whining cries for attention and business.

He goes, head down, and he does not ask questions. He does not bother the man with conversation. He feels his heart beat quick and quicker when someone whistles to him, makes a lewd gesture with their hand and he closes his eyes and just walks faster to keep up with the wide strides of the man who leads him from here.

He sees the hotel before he’s told to take the side road to the back. He goes only when the man leaves him, watching him enter the establishment first, disappear into the crowd. For a brief moment, he panics. This is the best and easiest way to leave him, to just have him wait and wait and wait until someone else finds him and drags him back. He tries not to think about it. He makes his way to the back of the hotel tiptoeing around the reeking puddles of garbage water from the bins piled high for pick-up day.

He waits. Shivering and little and dirty, he waits. Eyes up to the sky he hasn’t seen for months; he doesn’t know how long. He can see some stars, here, but not many. Too much light pollution, to much smoke and mess and sin. He jerks when the back door opens, pressing himself back against a bin and holding down the hem of his shirt so it pulls taut.

But it’s only him, only the man who promised.

He makes a weak little whimpering noise and goes when beckoned, using all the willpower he can not to press into the man in gratitude, in weakness. He is so tired he wonders how he can even move, but he does. Through the door and up the stairs and through the fire exit where the alarm has been de-activated, to a corridor so clean, he wonders if he’s in heaven. He’s too scared to step on the floor, but he follows when the man walks past him, leads him on, and turns to make sure he goes.

Just the one look, to ensure the boy has not fled or collapsed, and managed Hannibal into a worse position than he has already. Long strides carry Hannibal down the hall towards the single door at the end of it. He swipes the card from his pocket, and with a beep and a buzz opens it, holding it with a hand against the fine wood for the boy to enter.

He does not hurry him. There is no one else on the floor. There are no cameras here, usually the protocol of seedier establishments, but this one highbrow enough in clientele to have somehow circled back to a lack of surveillance in the interest of discretion for those who can afford it. In deference, perhaps, or discomfort, Hannibal averts his eyes from the hesitant steps of filthy feet across soft carpet, listening only to how they click sticky against the tile floor as the boy enters, listening to the hitch of his breath, as if by making that small he might make himself smaller too.

When the boy has stepped in enough, enough to see the wide windows overlooking Patpong, enough to see above the blinking neon that bathes the city in constant day, enough to see above the smog and smoke, where the river winds black between high-rises on either side. The room is dark, still, but enormous. He stops, just inside, letting his gaze settle on the city outside the window, and Hannibal holds the door a moment more, letting in only the dimmed light from the hallway.

“I’m going to close the door,” he says, not ungently. “May I turn on the light?”

The boy just nods, a quick thing, and keeps his hands tight in his shirt as the room darkens for a moment, then is bathed in light. He blinks rapidly, squinting until his eyes adjust, and then holds his breath, shocked, surprised, scared, all at once. Hannibal steps past him and the boy presses himself against the nearest wall, to be smaller, to be out of the way.

Hannibal lets the boy take everything in on his own, making his way to the kitchen to pour a glass of water for him. When he returns, the kid has barely moved, eyes wide and scared when they flick up to Hannibal, mistrusting the water offered him, before the man takes a sip himself.

"It's clean," he promises, watches the boy take it with both hands and dribble most down his shirt in his fervor to drink it down.

"Slow," Hannibal warns. "You will make yourself sick. Drink it slow. You can have as much as you like, from the kitchen." He points, watches as the kid slurps the last drops and clings to the glass, panting. He takes in the words, does not yet believe them. Hannibal doesn’t expect him to.

"You need a shower."

The boy tenses, immediately alarmed, and Hannibal just points, through the main room to the open door of his suite.

"There is a shower in there. Lock the door if you like, I won't go near you. There are towels there. I will lend you a shirt to sleep in."

The boy blinks, nervous, but moves on quiet feet, to go where he is directed. He peers into the room, carefully tiptoes to the bathroom and looks in there too. A frightened animal being released for the first time. Hannibal tries not to think about it. He waits for the boy to set his glass to the sink and turn to close the door, waits for the lock to click before he lets out a soft curse.

Years, in all likelihood. Years of being held, without freedom to breathe clean air or see the sky. Years of being shuttled from one room to the next and back again. Years of pain, of cruelty, and though Hannibal is not certain of the boy’s age, the thought of how young he must have been with this began sickens the man. He allows the revulsion to rise, to quicken his pulse and tighten his throat, and then with concentrated effort swallows it down again.

The water creates a stream of white noise, little squeaks punctuating the flow as the temperature is adjusted. It is too close, too close for Hannibal’s cover and too close for his own comfort, in recalling in a rush how he felt, once.

No.

He tells himself no. He will not bring that boy out to meet this one, but he will hear him. Hannibal moves to the small radio beside the bed and sifts through chatter and static until a classical station is found. The silence was deafening, he recalls, a terrifying quietude that in it held the promise of worse things than sound.

He leaves it playing softly, and takes from his closet an undershirt. Over the hanger, he rests a pair of boxers. It will all be too large on the boy, but there’s nothing to be done at this hour, and it is enough to keep him decent. Hannibal knocks on the door, eyes closing when there is a startled sound from the other side of it, and says only, “I have left you clothes upon the door.”

Hannibal doesn’t wait for a response.

He returns across the hotel room to the small kitchen. Something simple, something easy to digest. From the small refrigerator, Hannibal passes over the fine-sliced meat and rich purple organs, seeking out two eggs and butter. Scrambled, still soft, on the small stove, with only salt to season. Fresh fruit - melons and berries, nothing acidic - sliced alongside. A little powdered sugar atop these. A glass of water.

No more than that. The boy will be lucky if he keeps even this much down.

The water flows and flows, longer than it should to wash such a little body, but Hannibal knows it's because the boy is relishing every moment of freedom of getting clean, of having this unmolested time alone when at any moment it could be taken away. He does not rush the boy, does not startle him again. Minutes trickle by as water cascades over little shoulders and into the drain. Minutes until it finally stops, just drips to the floor of the shower.

It seems as though everything takes an eternity, for the boy to dry himself, for him to drink more water - the cold tap running to fill the glass he had taken with him - for the door to tentatively open and for him to take the hanger with clothes back into his safe space, door locking as he changes.

When it finally is opened again, the rooms fill with the clean smell of water and the hotel issue shampoo and soap. Hannibal looks up only when the boy pads out to him again, nervous and little. The shirt comes down to his knees, clean, now, but bruises just shadow against a little thigh before the shirt covers the worst of them. He holds his filthy clothes bundled in front of him with the towel, unsure of what to do with any of it.

He blinks when Hannibal gestures to the food, eggs kept warm in the oven for him, and holds his hand out for the bundle in return. It takes a while for the boy to let it go, but he does, careful not to touch Hannibal’s hands as he does, and he goes to hoist himself up on the bar stool, both hands on the seat to lever himself. He does not eat much, picking at the food and taking the fruit with his fingers to press between his lips. He is flushed when he leaves most on his plate, eyes skimming over it as though trying to decide how to store it away safe for next time, because there may not _be_ a next time.

“Do not,” Hannibal says, gently, he knows that look and he knows the impulse. He’s never lost it, the urge to make too much food, to save what he can, to use every part of every plant or protein when he’s cooking. Quieter, then, he adds, “Eat what you can. I will make more in the morning if you need.”

The boy doesn’t meet his eyes, nor - Hannibal is sure - does he believe him. He will find the eggs hoarded someplace, though perhaps the boy will eat them before he does. Humming, Hannibal releases a long breath, and passes by slowly - at distance greater than arm’s length - to dispose of the clothes. Music twines softly from the bedroom still, a sound to fill the silence between them.

Hannibal hesitates with the filthy clothes, held in hand above the bin, and looks back to the boy watching him wide-eyed, then narrow, then wide again. No, not narrowed - squinting. He wonders how long it’s been since the boy has had glasses to correct his near-sightedness.

He wonders if he ever has.

“You may keep them if you like,” Hannibal allows, hesitant. “But you will need something less in tatters before I bring you to the embassy. Shoes, at least.”

"I'm not American," the kid repeats, voice just above a whisper. He turns from the clothes and presses his lips together. Part of him wants the clothes to stay, he knows how they feel, where the holes are for him to curl his fingers in. Another part wants them gone. They will never be just clothes. He tugs the hem of the shirt he wears now, clean and warm and large, and wriggles back in his seat a little to push the boxers up over his bottom again.

"Where are you from?" Hannibal asks, and the boy curls his top lip over his bottom one, teeth worrying it where Hannibal can’t see. For a long time he is quiet, before he shakes his head. This isn’t petulance, it's shock. Amnesia brought on by terror and exhaustion and pain. It will come back. It might come back.

"What's your name?" Comes the next question, and at this the boy flicks his eyes up again. They search between Hannibal’s, over and over, before he parts his lips with his tongue.

"Will," he whispers.

“Will,” Hannibal repeats, and the smile he offers this time is genuine. There is that much, at least. A name, a voice to fuel it. Memories that may or may not return. Hannibal finds a catch hooked between his ribs when the boy ducks his head.

He hopes, at least, that if the older memories have been lost, the newer will go with them.

It is enough, for tonight, enough to have a name. Hannibal does not reach for the boy’s plate, but lets it stay just there for him to find again if he wishes it, though the thought of eating lukewarm eggs displeases the man as some minor injustice, heaped upon so many others. His water is refilled, and Hannibal drops the clothes into the bin without another word about it.

“There is a bed,” Hannibal says, and he keeps his expression smooth as stone as the boy’s shoulders draw up. “For you, alone. There are two bedrooms here. I will take one, the other will be yours until I resolve where you should go to be better cared for. You may lock the door. I will not enter it without your permission.”

He sets the glass down by Will and puts distance between them again, resting his back against the far counter, meeting the wild blue eyes, black-encircled, that watch him wary and unblinking.

“If you wish for anything, ask. If you need for something, tell me. I will be in the room just there where you bathed, and tomorrow find a better solution for us both,” Hannibal instructs softly. “Or shoes, at least.”

Will swallows and directs his eyes down again, fiddling with the hem of his borrowed shirt. When Hannibal moves towards the door to the other room, the boy follows, cradling his water in his hands like gold, turning to look over his shoulder to mourn the food he is leaving uneaten behind himself.

The room is huge, to Will’s eyes, and he waits for Hannibal to turn before setting his glass down on the bedside table. They do not talk more, they don’t need to, and Hannibal closes the door quietly behind himself when he goes.

Will watches it for a long time before going to the balcony instead and pulling open the door. The evening air is cold, and he returns to the bed to carefully work off the blanket from it and pull it around himself. He sits on the balcony and breathes, looks up at the sky until he starts to sway from exhaustion and moves back into the room. The classical music still plays, soft and wafting in the space. It isn’t the cruel beat of the club, it's too gentle, and Will opens the door to his room to walk quietly back to Hannibal's, blanket dragging with a hiss behind him.

He curls into a ball at the foot of the man's bed, on the floor, and buries himself in the blanket, and falls so quickly into sleep that he does not even dream.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I'll be quiet," Will whispers. "I'll be good, please don't send me away."
> 
> "Will."
> 
> "Who else will look after me?" Will asks. "You saved my life, so it's yours. If you send me away now, you’re as good as killing me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the exceptional [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

The boy is still asleep when Hannibal wakes. Or so he tries to seem, but Hannibal notes the jerk of muscle as soon as he moves, the way little fingers curl tighter, dreading, into the blanket around him.

In passing, Hannibal drapes his own blanket over the boy as well, and continues on in his morning.

He showers, bathroom door locked. Teeth brushed and hair combed. Dressed in a suit, as ever, pressed into sleek expensive lines. In this, Hannibal walks by the bundle on the floor, feigning notice that the boy is there at all. It will be enough of a shock to find himself here, when he fully wakens. More so to find himself unmolested and unharmed, nothing demanded of him, nothing forced upon him.

Hannibal clears away the remains of dinner from the night before, and leaves waiting another bowl of fruit, sprinkled with oats and a fresh yogurt - tart and fragrant - bought from the market the day before. He lets only the clicking of the door behind him herald his leaving, to make his way into the city once more.

It is already alive, choked with cars and motorbikes, with food stands selling breakfast to passers-by, tourists and locals alike. Hannibal finds his way to a department store, many stories high, and estimating the boy’s age to be somewhere between thirteen and fifteen, collects a few shirts, a hooded sweatshirt for when the evening becomes chill, pants and a pair of sneakers, white with blue stripes along the side. A supply of undergarments, briefs and socks.

He recalls even now, decades later, the wonder that rattled him through thin skin to fragile bones at having clean socks to wear, warm and soft against his feet. Hannibal rests his fingers on them for a moment more, and buys double what he needs.

He pays his baht and leaves, pausing only to gather a few groceries to replace what he has used. He buys oatmeal, gentle on an uneasy stomach, he buys juice to supplement what solid food will not. For himself, wine, because he’s certain that he’ll need it. And by the time he finally returns to the hotel, he has no more decided on what course of action to follow than when he left.

He hears the panicked scrambling when his card beeps and the lock clicks open, and takes his time opening the door so as not to spook the boy further, and finds him not in sight when he enters.

The breakfast has been touched, spoon still in the bowl and most of the yogurt gone, but there is no boy at the counter. Frightened back to the blankets, an ingrained terror that he will be punished for taking something offered him without giving something back. Hannibal makes noise when he moves around the suite, so Will knows where he is, so he doesn't feel stalked and hunted. At length, the little thing emerges, sleepy and messy-haired, from Hannibal's room.

"You ate," Hannibal comments, watches Will nod. "You can eat more."

Will hesitates, eyes seeking between Hannibal and the bowl, before he walks closer and clambers onto the stool again. There are still bags under his eyes but at least the boy’s pupils have shrunk to something normal, no longer blown in panic and sleeplessness.

Will takes the spoon up again and takes another piece of fruit from the end of it to chew. As Hannibal unpacks the groceries, Will eats. When he is finished, Will gently pushes the bowl to him, more than half still in it.

"You need to eat, too," he says gently.

Hannibal allows a gentle bemusement to lift his eyes, regarding the boy, and the bowl. “That is yours.”

“I don’t need it all,” Will says.

“But you may have it all. And more if you like.”

Hannibal lets his eyes trace briefly over the skinny arms stretched over the counter, bruises up high beneath the long sleeves of the shirt he wears, from being grabbed. From being thrown. But bruises will fade, and to Hannibal’s attention, in sight and scent alike, there are no worse physical injuries to which he would feel obligated as a doctor to tend. It is a relief, for the boy and for himself. He had thought with apprehension more than once about attempting to lay hands on him for even that, and is glad that for now he needs not.

Will watches him, expectant, and Hannibal takes a spoon for himself, to scoop a bit of pineapple and yogurt, polite.

“Now,” Hannibal says, “the rest is yours.”

He will make his own breakfast, and savor the sweetness of meat cooked into it, a succulent harmony in devouring one of the men who hurt boys like this.

The boy pulls the bowl back to himself but doesn't eat from it, he just holds it, protective, and watches as Hannibal starts to make his own breakfast. They are quiet, here, too, no need to fill in space with words. The music still plays, left on by Hannibal and untouched by Will, warming the space with violins and flutes.

Will gently pushes the bowl to one side and curls his arms over the counter, head resting on top. His eyes hood, then close, and he dozes as Hannibal works, jerking awake when there is a hiss in the pan, a clink of one utensil against another. He is still sleepy, could sleep for days if he was allowed, but is too scared to push his luck. He cannot drop his defenses so quickly, not when kindnesses have so often led to brutality.

"What's your name?" Will asks, words mumbled as he pushes himself to sit properly again. There is a pause, brief, in the preparation before the man obliges him.

"Hannibal."

The boy sits quiet a moment more, processing the word, the name, committing it to memory before he swallows.

"Thank you, Hannibal."

Hannibal allows a snap of tension at hearing his name spoken. His real name, and why he gave it - knowing the boy has seen him kill, knowing that in a matter of hours he will be given to authority figures - he isn’t sure. But the pull relaxes. Loyalty among boys like them is hard-won, but Hannibal assures himself that he has done nothing to harm the boy and risk his wrath.

He hopes.

Hannibal stands to eat, once more out of arm’s reach of the boy who watches him, sleepy-eyed, from beneath his hair. He envisions a bubble around him, a space that must be maintained, and does not pierce it except when Will’s attention drifts to his plate, and Hannibal raises a questioning brow.

Will shakes his head, and Hannibal eats in quiet, but for the soft strains of music and deepening breaths as Will settles again.

“There is a bag for you,” he murmurs. “Just beside the door to your room.”

"Why?" Immediately the tension, immediately the wariness where moments before Will had been relaxed and almost trusting, enough to rest vulnerable on the counter, anyway.

"I bought you some clothes," Hannibal explains. The next 'why' is whispered and Hannibal looks at the boy properly, taking in the wide eyes and fear. Nothing is free, not in the world they know. Nothing is without a price.

"Because you need them," Hannibal tells him. "I apologize, I had to guess your size."

Will doesn’t move, still frozen where he sits, and Hannibal sighs, just lets him take the time on his own. He has no answer beyond that he needs to take the boy to the embassy, and he cannot have him go as he is. The assumptions that would be made make Hannibal sick.

After a minute, curiosity gets the better of the boy and he goes, padding on soft feet to the bags waiting for him. He explores the contents carefully, fingers gentle over the soft fabric, much nicer than what he has had for the last long while. He slips from his underwear first, and into a pair that fits, and pulls the thick socks up as far on his legs as they will go. He doesn’t try on the shirts or pants. He returns to the counter in the shirt Hannibal had given him.

"What do you want?" Will asks, eyes demure and frown tight across his lips. No 'thank you' for this, only the minimum basics taken so he will not have to pay the highest price for them. Will waits.

Hannibal pauses, washing off his dish, Will’s still in front of him. There it will remain, until gone or the next meal, if Hannibal cannot get him to the embassy before that.

“I would like for you -” Will draws a breath, braced, and Hannibal hums before continuing. “I would like for you to finish your food. And I would like for you to dress, please.”

A little sound of discord, like a puppy’s growl, comes from the boy and Hannibal shuts off the water, drying his plate to set away.

“I would like you then to come with me to the embassy, and explain to them that you have been lost. If you were filed as missing, which I’m certain you must have been, they will find you in the records, and seek out next of kin.” A pause, and with a certain hopelessness, Hannibal adds, “And I would like if you said nothing of our meeting. It would be an impediment -” he pauses, revises. “A difficulty for me, if you did.”

Will watches him, little fists clenched in the shirt, not in anger but in helpless, confused desperation. He is not used to these things being asked of him, they are foreign. He is used to cruelties and patronizing voices telling him to be a good boy. He is used to rough fingers in his hair and a filthy taste in his mouth.

He is not used to this.

He shakes his head and swallows, doesn't understand, doesn't know how.

"I didn't get lost," Will whispers. "They told me my dad was in an accident, men in a uniform, like the doctors that ride the ambulance. They said he told them where to find me and that he wanted to see me, and I went with them. We were in a mall."

His voice peters put to a whisper and Will swallows again. He can't remember which mall. He can't remember which country. He just remembers that the last thing his dad told him was to wait, while he went to the restroom.

"I don’t -" Will swallows again, throat dry and panic setting in cold. "I'm not American," he whispers desperately. "Please don't take me there, they won’t know who I am, they'll make me go back to that street again, that room, they won’t believe me -"

Hannibal stops his motions through the kitchen, to listen, to hear. A sudden instinct, something innate that he has not yet managed to purge from himself, overtakes him to stroke the boy’s hair and console him. He does not, knowing that his touch would be anything but comforting.

The boy is American. He is sure of it, despite the protests. He knows from the crisp accent not yet beaten from him, the clear English spoken despite having likely heard it only rarely, and in moments better deafened to the words said in it. And yet Hannibal cannot bring himself to insist against Will’s claims. He lets them linger, and averts his eyes to the counter between them.

“I am sorry,” Hannibal says, “for what happened to you. If I could undo it all, I would. I cannot, but there are others who can help. Who will offer you assistance and care that I am unable to give. You cannot stay with me, Will, and I will not see you left back to the streets.”

"I'll be quiet," Will whispers. "I'll be good, please don't send me away."

"Will."

"Who else will look after me?" Will asks. "You saved my life, so it's yours. If you send me away now, you’re as good as killing me."

Will is trembling again, but there is a light in his eyes, a determination to stay with the only man who, in years, he thinks, has not laid a hand on him to hurt or abuse. Who killed his captor, who bought him clothes and fed him and let him sleep.

"I don’t eat much. And I don't need all the clothes, just the one shirt," he insists. "I won’t bother you, I'll just stay in the room and be quiet. And if you ever, if -" Will falters, shakes his head, bites his lip. "I would let you. I would. My life is yours because you saved it. I'll do anything."

“No,” Hannibal says, without hesitation. “Not that.” He parts his lips with his tongue and sighs as Will watches him. “I do not want that. From you, or from anyone. And I do not want you to do that for anyone.”

 _Not ever again_.

He could force the boy. He could take him, against his will, to the embassy. Relinquish him to their hands, and hope that they find whatever next of kin may exist, if any. From his story, there may be none, knowing the penchant for violence in the cartels that traffic in humans, in boys like him.

Like them.

Hannibal knows. He knows all too well, just as readily as he knows the alternative that may come with handing the boy off to government figures. If they cannot find family for him, he will be shunted into a system in many ways as cruel as the one from which Hannibal took him. Fosterage and orphanages, group homes where he is a number, rather than a face. Rather than a boy who needs help.

Help that Hannibal, here on extended holiday for his own untoward purposes, cannot provide any more readily.

“I cannot give you what you need,” Hannibal says, gentling his tone, just a little.

“I don’t need anything,” insists Will, voice only a hissed whisper, teeth clenched to hold back the tears already swimming in ocean blue eyes.

He will not force him. Without any more reason to know than his own instinct, Hannibal is certain that the boy would flee. It’s what he would do, were he in Will’s position. It’s what he did do, long ago.

“Until you are settled,” Hannibal breathes, cursing the words inwardly as he feels them splinter from the dark spaces between his ribs. “I will not make you go today.”

The boy trembles hard for a moment more, too many emotions all at once and makes that strange little noise again, that he had on the street before Hannibal told him he would not send him away then, too.

“I’ll be good,” he promises again. “I’ll be quiet, I won’t get in your way.”

He looks for a moment, like he will step close and press to the man again, gratitude wiping out any walls against contact he has so meticulously erected. For just a moment. Then Will seems to remember what Hannibal told him, and shuffles back to the bags by the door and slips into the pair of pants bought for him, keeping Hannibal’s longer shirt over the top to show nothing at all of his thighs or bottom. 

He chooses a shirt to put on instead of the one he was lent, and Hannibal catches more shadows of bruises there too. Over his shoulders, against the back of his neck. Bites that have faded, scratches that have yet to. Abuse in anger and in lust that the boy had to suffer, for no other reason than he believed someone he has been taught to trust, from grade school, that his father was unwell.

Will returns to the counter, to his bowl, and presses his lips together, eyes up and apologetic.

“I can’t eat more, now,” he says. “I will, I promise I will.”

This, at least, Hannibal can manage, well enough for now. “Do not force yourself,” he says, keeping the dish in view as he moves it to find space in the little refrigerator. “It is here, if you are hungry. There is more,” he adds, perhaps curiously to anyone who hasn’t been where they both have. “There will always be more. Whether you would like it to sate taste or hunger.”

He closes the refrigerator and regards the boy. Though Will is clothed, Hannibal cannot remove the impression of bruises blooming black over him, scars from mouths and hands and worse, the most dire of which he knows cannot be seen outward.

“All I ask,” Hannibal intones, “is that you let me know when you are in need, or want. If you wish to go out, I will go with you. If you are hurt, I will try to help. Until such time as you are whole enough to go, all I want of you,” he says, “is to be honest with me.”

Will nods, just once, a slow incline of his head as he keeps his eyes up to Hannibal’s. It’s clear he is skeptical but he isn’t being difficult. Processing, still, that this is happening, that he is not there anymore, that he is here now, for some unknown reason to either of them, he is here.

“Okay,” Will says finally, moving his hands to press into his pockets - pockets! - as he wriggles his toes in his socks. The clothes are warm and comfortable, just a little too big but only because he himself is so thin. Hannibal has a good eye, Will feels his cheeks warm thinking about it. He wonders why he cares, he wonders why he came there at all, if what he does is a cover for something worse, if he himself is undercover and just overreacted.

“Will you be honest with me?” Will asks, genuine, not a demand but a request he hopes is agreed to.

Hannibal smiles, a brief thing, but earnest, and the first of it that Will has seen today. The older man ducks his head in thought. “Much as I can be,” he offers, lifting his gaze again to be met with an arched brow and a squint.

He sighs. “Yes,” Hannibal amends. “Within reason.”

Still, Will doesn’t relent in the long look he lets linger on Hannibal, watching through him more than his surface. It sends a curl of alarm through Hannibal, quickly quieted. He is only a boy, and one who has only just emerged into light after years of darkness.

Mercy, then.

“Yes,” Hannibal says, finally.

The answer is satisfactory enough, and the boy hides a smile behind pressed lips. And Hannibal wonders if that question in itself was not a test of honesty. Will nods again, and moves to settle into one of the sofas, where he can still see Hannibal in the kitchen, where he can see the city.

He doesn’t ask for more, has too many questions to put on the man now, and he had promised not to bother him. Will watches the skyline, watches the cars that appear as ants down on the ground below, can see where the city proper melds into the squalor and slums from which he had been rescued. He wonders if anyone else sees. He wonders if anyone bothers to see.

He turns to Hannibal instead, rests his head against the arm of the couch and just watches him as he moves around the kitchen. He is elegant, suited as he is, graceful. Moves like a dancer. Will wonders who he is, why he is here, why he is doing this at all.

He can feel his eyes drooping again, shakes his head to stay awake, notices the moment Hannibal notices.

“Rest,” he says, and Will shakes his head again.

“Are you a businessman?” Will asks him instead.

Hannibal is grateful for the question, for its existence as indicating a curiosity in the boy whose gaze has been flattened to a dread acceptance of fear and pain as the way in which he would live his life. Curiosity is interest in the world. Curiosity is the fuel of life.

“A doctor,” he answers, “when I am not here.”

The boy accepts the answer, enough, and Hannibal nearly mouths the words that follow. “And when you are here?”

Folding the little towel provided by the hotel for the kitchen, once over, then again, Hannibal sets it aside and with the kitchen clean - he insists that staff not broach his room, at any time - he circles the small island counter. Socked feet press silent to the carpet, and Hannibal settles slowly into a chair across from the couch, legs crossing, to watch Will.

Will who once had a home, and now has none.

Will who has, at least, a name.

“I do what I can,” Hannibal says, words plucked carefully to explain without explaining. “To help those that I can.”

“You pretend to want to buy boys?” Will asks, rolling over to look at Hannibal this way, as he lies on his side with his head pillowed on the arm of the couch.

“Sometimes,” Hannibal replies, setting an elbow to the arm of the chair, hands clasped against his lap as he watches WIll shift to adjust himself as he lies, stretching his feet out, arching his neck before coiling up again.

“But you never actually buy boys?”

Hannibal swallows. “Never for that.”

Will hums, brows furrowed. Not so much disbelief as consideration. People like Hannibal exist in fairy tales, they exist in stories of Robin Hood and in superhero comic books. Will wonders if Hannibal sees himself that way, if he knows that Will does. He wonders if he should tell him.

“How many have you helped?”

Hannibal could recite them all, from the first shoved towards him as he walked down the street, a wide-eyed girl decades younger than he, until each boy in the room the night before. He closes his eyes and lets their dark stares and broken bodies pass through his memory, before answering.

“Many,” he says, plucking a stray thread from the knee of his trousers. “And never enough.”

Watching the sweep of Hannibal’s hand as he smooths the fabric flat again, Will furrows his brow, and tucks his arms against his chest. “Do you always kill them? The men who keep them.”

Hannibal’s soft smile says enough, and with a long breath, he says only, “Sleep.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Will goes to the bathroom, taking his new comb and toothbrush with him, and turns on the light. Before him stands a boy who can already see over the vanity, whereas the last time he remembers looking he still had to push on tiptoes to try, hair a mess and eyes rimmed pink with tiredness. There are bags, too, beneath them, from lack of sleep accumulated over the months - years? - he had been in that tiny room._
> 
> _Will touches his face, like he never has before, as though it is entirely new, as though it is someone else’s. He stretches the skin, draws fingers over chapped lips, bares his teeth - in desperate need of brushing - and rubs his eyes._

Will wakes with a jerk and immediately scrambles to gather himself into as small a ball as he can.

It’s dark, only the city lighting the room he sleeps in. Still on the couch, but with a blanket tucked in around him now, the same one he had pulled off his bed the night before to curl on the floor with. It takes several moments before Will remembers where he is, why classical music is playing and not pulsing bass and techno. It takes several moments before Will braves climbing off the couch to pad to Hannibal’s room and into the bathroom, locking the door before he takes down his pants to pee.

The suite is empty when he explores it after, no Hannibal. And Will wonders if he has been abandoned here, instead of the street. The panic tightens around his throat but he manages to swallow it down.

Maybe he just had business.

Maybe he’s out saving more people like Will.

He hopes so.

Tentatively, Will opens the fridge to find his unfinished breakfast still there. He takes it down and finds the cutlery, settling into the couch again to eat, taking his time as the cold fruit hurts his teeth until they grow used to the temperature. He lets his eyes skim the city again, the deceptively happy lights in the parts of town that draw his entire being to tension. Slowly he lowers them to the table, expansive and glass, before him, between the couch and the chair Hannibal had sat in earlier.

On it, is a note and several objects Will had missed before. Three pairs of glasses, neatly folded, the tags still attached, a toothbrush and a comb. He bites his lip and leans closer to take up the note. In elegant hand, sit just a few simple words. _These are for you. I will be back by early morning. Take your time to rest. - Hannibal_

\---

“How many?”

“Come in, I’ll show you -”

“You have -”

“Yes, yes, come in.”

Hannibal follows. Another hypnotic bass thud pounds behind his eyes, a faster tempo but one to mark the steadiness of his heart. Another dismal back room past girls who alternately beckon and watch wary, reflected in endless number into the mirrors that surround them. Another threadbare couch with faded spots in the upholstery and cigarette burns on the arms.

Another night in Patpong.

Scarlet lights fill the room with crimson glare. The proprietor’s shirt, festive bright colors, becomes a whirl of black and red. Hannibal sits on the edge of the couch, and man beside him barks an order into the darkness.

 _Come now_.

They do. Three, tonight, making twelve in total for two nights. It could be more. In some way, Hannibal is glad it is not. He turns as if to survey them, dressed in ill-fitting clothes of a nature far older than their own, and lets his gaze rest just above their heads, and again on the dark floor beneath their feet.

“Which one do you like?”

Hannibal tilts his head, chin brushing the starched collar of his shirt, and answers, “All of them.”

“It’s too much.”

“It isn’t,” Hannibal retorts, inflecting an air of insult that quails the man a little, sending him nearly off the edge of the couch in his insistence.

“Too much noise,” the man suggests with a laugh, miming tears, and Hannibal stops the motion with a look.

“I have the money. I want them. How much?”

Every proprietor’s favorite question, enough to render them senseless in their greed, assuage their fears and false alarms. Hannibal lifts a hand to stop him before he can speak, and motions to the three watching, fingers gathered in little fists at their sides.

“You have a room?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Here.”

“Yes.”

Hannibal inclines his head, and the man motions towards the hall from which they came. “Have them wait there,” Hannibal says. This draws a look, some last animal instinct in the man that narrows his eyes. A smile eases the look. “I prefer it this way.”

Another picky customer with money to blow on wares for which the man has little care beyond this. Another peculiar impulse, to be catered to, or else the client will walk. Another coarse order sends little feet clicking bare across the floor, and Hannibal waits to hear the door close, a distant click off-time with the music that dulls the senses and shame of so many.

“Now,” Hannibal says softly. “Now we may discuss in private.”

\---

Will finds the third pair of glasses feel the best. The city lights look clearer, less a smear against the window, but distinct patterns, now, words and signs and flashing symbols. He wears them as he wraps the blanket around himself again and goes to the balcony off the main room to sit there instead.

He rests with his back against the glass balcony barrier, cheeks resting against the bunched blankets around him, and looks up. He doesn’t count the stars, he knows he won’t manage to, but he watches the patterns, brings a finger up to trace them, dot to dot, one eye closed and then the other, delighting when the image shifts with just a blink.

He sits for a long time, classical music wafting through the open door. He’s started to recognize patterns in that, as well. He can name the composer, now, before the track begins, and usually guess right. He understands how the music arches and tilts, how one tempo is so common for one composer but not another. He wonders if there’s a job, in that, guessing music on the radio. He wonders if Hannibal knows the composers too.

He goes inside when it gets too cold, and when his legs get sore, bent as they are beneath him.

Will goes to the bathroom, taking his new comb and toothbrush with him, and turns on the light. Before him stands a boy who can already see over the vanity, whereas the last time he remembers looking he still had to push on tiptoes to try, hair a mess and eyes rimmed pink with tiredness. There are bags, too, beneath them, from lack of sleep accumulated over the months - years? - he had been in that tiny room.

Will touches his face, like he never has before, as though it is entirely new, as though it is someone else’s. He stretches the skin, draws fingers over chapped lips, bares his teeth - in desperate need of brushing - and rubs his eyes.

And then he gets the toothbrush, using Hannibal’s toothpaste already on the vanity. He brushes twice. Then he brushes without toothpaste just to clean the residue from his mouth. He brushes again, after, foam spitting red into the sink where his gums are no longer used to the feel of a brush against them. Will doesn’t care. He cleans until he feels clean. Like he had in the shower, the night before. Like he will, over and over again, until he starts to feel like that boy again.

The boy who still knew how to smile.

In the mirror, now, with cheeks flushed and lips red where he had scrubbed them smooth as well, he looks a little more like that boy.

Will doesn’t comb his hair. He turns off the light and goes back into the suite again. For a long while he stands by the couch, unsure of what to do, or where to go. He hasn’t been awake for long, but already his body is swaying with exhaustion, already his head feels muddled and filled with cotton wool.

Will chews the side of his thumb, a nervous little tic, before he turns to take the blanket and returns to Hannibal’s bedroom. With the man away, Will climbs carefully onto the big bed, right into the center of it, pulling his blanket on top, and curls there to rest. He hears Chopin and Tchaikovsky and Holst before the rest muddles to soft violins and heavy horns.

\---

The man manages two steps to escort Hannibal to the room, before Hannibal manages two hands around his head to break his neck. Cartilage crackles between vertebrae elegantly displaced, enough to paralyze but not yet to kill. Even if he were not numb, Hannibal would not release him any more gently to the ground, doing so only when the thick thud of his body bounces in time with the bass.

He checks the door to the back room, ensuring it is locked. He checks the door to the bedroom down the hall, ensuring it is closed. He tries to appreciate a sense of shame in keeping these offerings under some vague motions towards privacy, but knows it has less to do with shame than it does to keep the ones being offered from escape. There is a back door, beside the bedroom, Hannibal knows without needing to check.

He checked two days prior, making his rounds to follow the behavior of his prey.

Comfortable in solitude, despite the wet guttering gasps of the man on the floor, Hannibal opens his bag and unfurls a plastic coverall, taking his time in dressing. Perhaps it’s for the best that the night before did not end this way. Variation creates confusion in those looking for patterns, if any are. One must always assume, despite Hannibal’s increasing doubts as to any remaining threads of care or competence in local agencies.

They stand to gain as much in lucre gained from the bodies of those enslaved as the ones who enslave them.

Hannibal allows the scalpel to shine, lit luminous as if it were aflame. The rattled breath quickens, though provides no more air than before, just a faster rhythm. Just as empty. He works a gloved hand down the buttons of the man’s garish shirt, and though the nerve endings beneath the foramen magnum have been snipped between sharp bone, the man does not need to feel the blade press beneath his rib to see his blood seep black across the floor.

Hannibal only regrets that shock kills the man before he can show him the parts that Hannibal takes in retribution for how much the man has taken from others.

\---

Will wakes immediately when the door opens, tensing in bed, eyes wide, and listening, past the soothing tones of Bach, to the sound of heavy footfalls by the door until it closes. They change to a soft hiss after, socks against tile, socks against carpet. Will feels his entire body tremble and he can’t control it. He should have locked the door. He should have checked the door. He shouldn’t have fallen asleep.

He lays in bed and shakes, peeling down the blanket just enough to see through the frame of the door, lit light, now, with the warmth of the kitchen lamps. He waits.

He waits until a shadow is framed in the door and then he buries himself beneath the blankets with a whimper and curls as tight into a ball as he possibly can.

It was easy enough to assure the little ones who - rightfully - mistrust his words that the oldest should take them, and go. Easy enough to wait until they emerged into the street, with whispered words and rough-wrought awareness, before hurrying for home or something like it. Easy enough to dispose of the suit and gloves in separate back alley bins during his long walk back.

To home, or something like it.

All easy enough.

This is a far more complicated matter.

On the table are the glasses not near enough the boy’s prescription, beside the dish from morning. Resisting the urge to offer food again - as much to soothe himself with a dedicated action as to fill the boy with sustenance too long denied - Hannibal instead takes thin comfort in the fact the boy has rested. 

“I need only to use the washroom, and retrieve a change of clothes to sleep in,” Hannibal says, angling his body sidelong to the door to remove the shadow he casts across the bed and thin it askew. “I will not enter without your permission. But with your room similarly off-limits, you present a difficulty in needing to use the facilities,” he adds, gently teasing.

Will swallows down his panic, takes deeper breaths to soothe himself and slowly wriggles out from under the covers to look at Hannibal, leaning in the doorway. His head is down, lips parted as he breathes, and Will traces his silhouette over and over with his eyes before letting out a shivering breath.

“Sorry,” he whispers. “I’m sorry, I - the radio was in here, I don’t - I don’t like how quiet it is in my room. I didn’t want to move anything.”

Will sits up in bed, blanket up as a shield against himself and anything that might hurt him, cheeks bright with embarrassment as he stumbles over his words. He swallows again and nods when Hannibal tilts his head, seeking permission to enter - his own room - again.

“I ate what was in the fridge, I promised I would,” Will says, words unable to stop, now that they’re going, another defense when silence proves too stifling. He bites down against the blanket to stop from speaking more, from taxing Hannibal with his silly worries.

“I’m glad,” Hannibal says, and in his voice, a patience born of weariness. “I will make you something else, if you like. What’s there is yours,” he pauses. “The meat will need to be cooked, so anything but that.”

It is late, or early, depending on one’s inclinations. The scents of smoke and viscera stick to him as he passes by, towards the bathroom. Will’s toothbrush is moved aside and Hannibal pools cool water in his palms before bringing it to his face. It shines across his face, dripping from the hard line of his jaw as he regards himself, before patting dry with a towel and closing the door.

Will waits, uncertain, shaking so hard the bed quakes with him. If Hannibal is angry, he hides it well, but the potential that there may be no retribution to this - and in some way, Will senses there will not be - is just as confusing. The sounds within the bathroom continue for a time, as Bach becomes Handel, as Handel becomes… Will doesn’t know, but he picks from the Thai that he understands Ravel, and notes it to himself, if nothing else than for something to focus on.

When Hannibal emerges again, the sound and light from the bathroom door opening is enough to startle the boy to attention. If Hannibal notices, he does not show it. Suit in hand and towel around his waist, hair slicked back wet and face clean-shaven, he pads around the bed to the closet to hang his clothes and seek out a change to take with him. Will extends a foot across the bed, towards the edge, and without looking, Hannibal tells him, “Stay.”

“But -”

“Stay, if you are comfortable here. There is room enough in the suite for us both.”

Will swallows, draws his foot back to himself again and bunches the blankets between his hands as he regards Hannibal this way. He has a broad back, strong, tiny pale scars here and there that Will wants to know about but will never ask him. He watches the man’s shoulders shift, the muscles beneath tanned skin hard and well worked.

Will bites his lip when Hannibal turns profile, holding out a shirt on its hanger to consider before carefully peeling it off to hold against his spread fingers. His chest is furry, dark curled hair that grows sparser as it disappears beneath the towel.

Will turns away from looking lower. Still terrified and disgusted by everything else he has been forced to see from other men, with their alcohol breath and patronizing words, who praised him and called him a good boy, a pretty little thing, a sweet little slut.

"I got used to sharing a room," Will explains, as Hannibal turns to the closet again. "Always at least four of us there, sometimes more. It's strange to have one to myself."

He shrugs the blankets higher up against himself and turns wide blue eyes to Hannibal again. "This is your room, I... I just like knowing someone is breathing nearby, because it means I am too."

Hannibal’s hands still in his shirt, just a beat, before he tugs it over his head. With a hand on his towel, baring nothing, he slips into briefs, into sleep pants after, and so dressed returns his towel to the bathroom.

“It took me many years to learn to sleep easily, alone,” he admits. “Let alone in silence. Despite the misery of circumstance, the orphanage was the only home I knew, and quiet meant far worse things than the noises of others around me.”

Light filters in from the small living room outside, enough to keep the bedroom illuminated when Hannibal switches off the bathroom light. He considers the bed, the offer made and the admission that accompanied. It unsettles him to think of the attachment in such an act, the nearness of it rather than keeping the boy at arm’s length - further, when possible.

“If it will be easier for you, there is room enough for us both and space between,” Hannibal offers. “If you would rather not, I will stay on the couch, near enough to be reached if you need.”

Will shakes his head quickly, shifting to kneel on the bed. “Please don’t go to the couch, this is your room, I just -” He makes a noise, the smile that curls his lips isn’t one of pleasure. “I shouldn’t have slept here, it’s yours. I can sleep on the floor, I’m used to sleeping on the floor. Will… will you let me sleep here?”

Will moves to stand from the bed again, blankets draped up over his shoulders like a cape. He’s still dressed beneath it, in the pants and shirt Hannibal had gotten for him, but barefoot again. He looks entirely too little, hair mussed and eyes wide and cheeks pink from being woken so suddenly and seeing Hannibal so casually attired.

“You are welcome to sleep wherever it finds you most easily,” Hannibal tells him, raising a hand to slow the boy’s movements before he can dart further. “If that is the floor, I won’t stop you. If it is this bed, or another, then better still for you to recover.”

He deliberately slows his movements, so that each can be seen before it occurs. Bending to the edge of the bed opposite Will, Hannibal peels back the sheets and spreads them flat with practiced motions, before settling upon the edge. He does not look back to the boy, hands resting on his knees, and then brings his legs up to stretch long beneath the expensive sheets. They are warmed, still, by the little body that curled up on them.

“I apologize for the glasses,” he murmurs, scrubbing a hand over his face before letting it rest at his side. “They should ease your headaches, at least. I imagine you need a stronger prescription, but without having your eyes checked -” A sigh ends his words, and Hannibal trains the frustration from his features to keep his appearance neutral.

This isn’t his problem.

Will stays at the side of the bed, unsure, still, if he wants to curl up on the floor or take the side of the bed unoccupied by the man. There is a lot of space between them, even if Will were to stretch out and not lay curled in a little ball like he has grown so used to sleeping. He chews his lip.

“I’ve never had my eyes checked before,” Will says softly, turning back and forth in little motions, nervous, indecisive.

Kindness has turned to cruelty before. Men who had claimed that all they wanted was a soft boy to sleep against were the ones that left marks, the ones that encouraged Will to cry so they could hurt him more. He does not feel that sense of dread from Hannibal, he does not fear him like he did the others. But years and years of this have Will wary, have him standing, still, instead of moving one way or another.

“Where did you go?” he asks after a moment, finding that the more they talk, together, the more his shivering is soothed. He likes Hannibal’s voice. He likes the lilt of it and the curve of the vowels on his accent. He likes how gentle it is, even in anger.

“Silom Soi,” Hannibal says, and he’s careful to smooth out his pronunciation to avoid the sharp peaks and valleys of the language, his own instead rolling languid across the words. He only moves enough to turn to his back and settle, and bring an arm to rest across his eyes.

“Did you kill someone?”

The question gives Hannibal pause, brow lifting unseen. There is an interest in Will’s voice, a curiosity. Fearlessness. Perhaps some thin vein of pleasure, threaded throughout.

Hannibal smiles, a little.

“You did, didn’t you,” Will says. “Like before.”

“There are certain ways to live one’s life that renders it forfeit,” Hannibal answers, after a long silence filled with the quiet strains of Debussy. “Those choices are made long before I give their consequence. Others are not given a choice, until such time as someone returns their freedom to them.”

Will sighs, a little sound, and whispers, “How many?”

“Three.”

Will’s throat works in a swallow, brows furrowed as his eyes widen, as his lips gently part on a breath. Three. Three more children just like him, no longer crammed in their filthy rooms, no longer shoved and haggled over and sold for sex. Three more. Because of this man.

Without a word, Will looks towards the open bedroom door, the light in the living area still on. He doesn’t want to turn it off, he doubts Hannibal will mind if it stays on ‘til morning. He pushes up gently on his toes, sinks back to his heels again and then slowly, cautiously, crawls back into bed beside the older man, blue eyes on him until he settles, cocooned in his blanket for safety and warmth both.

He faces him, does not trust him enough to curl on his other side and show him his back. Will nuzzles into his blanket and blinks at Hannibal.

“Did you leave him there, too?” he asks softly. “The man?”

Hannibal thinks of his own satisfaction, in the act of lancing festering boils from humanity itself. He thinks of the pleasure he took in butchering his own captors. For a moment, he allows that boy inside himself to hear these things, and finds only a resounding relief in response.

And so he answers honestly.

There is no shame in this.

“What was left of him.”

Will laughs, a very brief, nervous little thing, and blinks liquid blue at the man before him. He is in awe, that someone could do this, that they would, that they do. Killing those that deserve to die, saving those that cannot save themselves in a city filled with sin and corruption.

Will doesn’t move closer, but he shifts to stretch his hand out under his blanket, still wrapped and still tight, but he reaches, into the space between them on the bed, the space between their words and their actions that slowly peel away the nervousness that pulls at Will so viciously.

“Sleep,” he tells Hannibal, as the man had the day before, to him. Reassurance, and gratitude and pride. And in the biggest show of trust the boy can allow himself, he closes his eyes first.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Will follows, taking in the atmosphere and life of a part of the city he has never seen. He jogs to catch up with Hannibal’s wide strides and walks beside him, hands on his pockets and feeling safe when he’s this close to him. Here, no one looks at them twice. No one leers at Will like they had when Hannibal had led him here that night, ragged and dirty. No one calls out for them, if they want a boy or a girl, and how young. No one grabs at Will, no one twists his arms, weak and little, to hold him to look at him restrained._
> 
> _No._
> 
> _This is not the city Will knew._
> 
> _This is something magical._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our intrepid darling [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

The day when Hannibal will return Will to the embassy never seems to come.

Instead, in fits and starts, they begin to find their own rhythm. Hannibal cooks, always vegetarian, and Will eats. Hannibal leaves in the evening, and Will sleeps. They circle each other at distance, but each comfortable in their own sphere, until they settle into a back and forth movement through the hotel suite.

They speak, of nothing in particular, but for the constant question that Hannibal hears every night when they settle to opposite sides of the bed.

_How many?_

He thinks less often of the urgency to have Will away from him, in safer hands than his own, to family who may be missing him, if there are any to be found. He thinks more frequently now of what the boy needs, to be comfortable or healthy, to be as fearless always as Will shows in glimmers.

Will laughs, now and then, and every time it pushes further away the thought of shunting him into a system whose abuses Hannibal knows all too well.

Hannibal smiles, in earnest, more than he has in years.

The company is welcome. And it is on a quiet morning, the last dish set away, that a fit of fond whimsy strikes the man. He glances to the boy on the couch, paging through a comic book from the English newsstand that Hannibal brought home for him.

“Would you like to go out today?”

Will wriggles around in his seat and arches to set his head against the elbow where the back of the couch meets the arm of it. He blinks at the words, turns his head a little more, to have Hannibal perfectly poised upside down in the center of his vision, and chews his lip.

He has not felt trapped here, but he has not left the hotel room since Hannibal had snuck him into it several weeks ago. He considers the possibility of leaving, of being out again in the city that had so long been his prison. He has, in truth, never actually seen it beyond what the tiny, dirty window in their room had offered. And perhaps with Hannibal he would be safe, during the day, to go out and explore it.

“Where would we go?” Will asks him, smiling a little. “Where do you like to go?”

Hannibal watches the boy, upside down, and returns the smile before turning away to fold the dish towel onto the counter. “We could walk along the river - Chao Praya,” Hannibal suggests. “See the temple there - Wat Arun. Of course, you have seen it from here, but it is much lovelier in person.”

He winds around the counter, feeling Will’s eyes follow him as he does. “If there are things you need, or would like, we can find them,” he offers, with a smile just in the muscles beneath his eyes. “So that you are not at my mercy for choosing what I think you might enjoy.”

Will wriggles a little more, almost fussy but pleased to be, enjoying the man’s words and smiles. In the time he has been here, never once has Hannibal raised his voice. Not even when Will had wet the bed in terror from a nightmare, not when he had locked himself in the bathroom after for hours, with the water running to make the white noise and steam clear his head. Always patient, always gentle. Suggesting, but never coaxing.

Will’s choices are always his own.

He has grown into his clothes a little, too, with more - and regular - meals that sustain him, not just keep him conscious. He is grateful, day after day, and the gratitude manifests itself as a soft lump in his chest that throbs and trembles when Hannibal looks at him the way he does, or walks past him on his way to the bedroom. Or anything at all.

He is in love with the idea of what Hannibal is. A savior, an anti-hero who kills the bad to save the good, because he feels it right to.

“Okay,” he says, folding his comic closed again and setting it to the table, rolling onto his stomach to watch Hannibal this way, as well. “Let’s go. I would like to go.”

Another bemused look from the older man, one that manifests from a far deeper pleasure, in seeing a boy who - left there - would have certainly, in one harrowing way or another, died in that place. Ruddy warmth has returned to his cheeks, brightness in his eyes like the sun across water. Clean hair and clean teeth. Healthy.

Alive.

Curious and kind and funny, when he can be. Brave, even when he cannot be, to face down the lightless places still inside of him.

Hannibal knows them well, and he knows they never truly go away. The most one can do is shine the brightest light they can, in whatever way they can, to make those corners small.

“Very well,” agrees Hannibal. “Put on your shoes, and we will go. Tell me if you become tired, and we’ll return.”

He seeks out his own jacket, entirely unnecessary in the thick, hot air of the city - like an oven, heated to a broil and left open. As Will slips from the couch, Hannibal considers that they look enough alike on the surface - dark hair, both, pale skin, foreign - that they are unlikely to attract questions.

Will makes his way to the bathroom first, to brush his hair and check it in the mirror, to adjust the soft collar of his polo shirt so he looks nice. Presentable. At least somewhat human next to the man in the bespoke suit that he will be walking beside. In the main room, he pushes his feet into his new shoes and laces them up, standing and looking to Hannibal for approval.

He feels much more alive than he did when he was first brought here. He doesn’t jump at every little sound, now, can distinguish between hotel staff walking down the corridor, knows, now, the slow and deliberate pace of Hannibal’s own footfalls. He sleeps - most nights - without waking, without panic and terror and embarrassing messes on the bed. He sleeps - every night - in Hannibal's bed with him, the space between them enough for one more person, and neither cross that barrier to touch the other.

Will is slowly growing to trust in this thing they have. Whatever it is. Whatever it could be.

He wants to learn more, wants to do more than exist on Hannibal’s time and coin, giving nothing back. He wants to show Hannibal he can do something, he can help. That he wants to help.

Hannibal holds the door for him, as they go.

Down the elevator, dropping quick enough that Will grasps the unsmudged railing beside him and grins, despite paling at the sudden movement. Through the lobby, golden lights mirrored off the white marble floor, as business people come and go, families, all in various languages. Hannibal lifts a hand to the desk staff as he goes. He informed them, a week before, that his son was staying with him, having come in on a late night flight from America to visit.

He told the same to the evening crew, but it was a flight the afternoon before.

The door out to the street is held for them both, by a young man who tips his hat to Will.

Will can feel the rise in temperature immediately, once they are out past the safety of the air conditioning. Humidity and different smells and sounds hit him all at once and for a moment, Will stops, just on the edge of the sidewalk, to listen. To experience this now that he no longer has a price on him.

It is incredibly busy. People and people and more people. So many tourists that Will laughs for a moment, bringing his thumb to his teeth to chew absently on the side of it, other hand up against his elbow as though to hold it up, or himself together. He turns his eyes to Hannibal and follows as the man steps back and gracefully turns on his heel to lead them to the river.

Will follows, taking in the atmosphere and life of a part of the city he has never seen. He jogs to catch up with Hannibal’s wide strides and walks beside him, hands on his pockets and feeling safe when he’s this close to him. Here, no one looks at them twice. No one leers at Will like they had when Hannibal had led him here that night, ragged and dirty. No one calls out for them, if they want a boy or a girl, and how young. No one grabs at Will, no one twists his arms, weak and little, to hold him to look at him restrained.

No.

This is not the city Will knew.

This is something magical.

Hannibal slows his steps a little, to keep time with the scuffling at his side. He does not expect to make it to the temple today, an hour’s walk if paced reasonably, but the boy has been without exercise for long enough that he will almost certainly exhaust himself before then. They will endeavor, then, if not this time, then the next, a little further each outing until they reach it, until they scale its steps, and look across the river to the Grand Palace.

He catches his thoughts too late, and as if they were smoke, disperses them.

Instead, he focuses on this outing, teaching Will useful words in Thai along the way, pointing out landmarks by which they navigate to the water’s edge. Away from the car-choked streets that fill the air with a constant drone of horns, to where there are boats, instead, humming past, some small and wide, others long and slender.

“ _Ruuea_ ,” Hannibal tells him. “Boat.” A pause, and Hannibal inclines his head towards a far faster one that skiffs along the top of the water, motor buzzing loud. “ _Ruuea-dùuan_ ,” he adds. “A speed boat.”

Will repeats the words under his breath and commits them to memory. He had learned, through exposure, some words already, but he is too frightened to ask what they mean. Instead he starts to point to things and ask for their words, slowly piecing sentences together, childish and simple, but he grins when he succeeds.

It is perhaps an hour out when Will grows tired. Hungry again and desperately thirsty in the heat, but he says nothing. He waits to see if Hannibal needs either, waits to see if they will turn back or go on but he does not ask, too long taught not to.

He walks into Hannibal, just enough to jar himself to attention, and drops his hands deep into his pockets.

"Sorry," he breathes, eyes up, cheeks flushed. "I'm sorry, I wasn’t looking."

The older man stops, turning slow to face him. Gently - never with anger, not once - Hannibal asks, “What did we agree, Will?”

The boy swallows, presses his lips together and parts them with a quiet breath. "That I would be honest.” He knows Hannibal wants more, furrows his brows gently and lets his eyes flick away before sliding back. "That I would tell you if I needed anything."

Hannibal tilts his head, as if in thanks, as if listening to something from very far away. He is careful, now, to fold his hands behind his back, perhaps a sterner stance in some ways, but safer all the same - withdrawing from the boy’s space, as he feels it shrink a little smaller. “Why have you not?” Hannibal asks, and adds with a smile that draws up his eyes, just a little, only there, “I am a great many things but I am, unfortunately, not able to read minds. Especially very clever ones.”

Will blushes darker, looks away from the man smiling above him. He can feel it almost like heat, like a hand against his face, that soft expression of utter fondness. Will does not know why he gets it, how he deserves it, but he strives to receive it.

"I don’t know how," he whispers, smile catching the next words. "In Thai."

It is only a breath, just a sigh - a fraction of one, really, but on it, there is a laugh, as Hannibal regards him. Others pass by, few glance, perhaps assuming him a father, speaking to his son. Or a teacher, tutoring a particularly apt pupil.

The latter, Hannibal supposes, is not entirely incorrect.

“Ask me, then, in English,” he suggests, “and I will teach it to you in Thai.”

Will bites his lip and takes a breath, straightening his shoulders as he looks at Hannibal and allows his smile to warm from the reassurance he sees there.

“Can we get something to drink, please?” He asks.

“Very polite,” Hannibal responds, with almost tangible approval. He takes a moment to sift through the words and offers them back, in Thai. The boy shakes his head the first time, and asks him to repeat. He does, a little slower, and Will repeats the words back.

Back and forth, at distance and in nearness all at once, they trade the phrase until Will speaks it clearly, and quickly, his pitches peaking and diving and his grin suddenly wide.

“Yes, we may,” Hannibal answers with a soft smile, and turning to seek out a food stand for water, sugary pineapple, perhaps an ice cream, Hannibal without thinking extends his hand to the boy. 

Will’s cheeks alight, and he takes it before he can think better. Hannibal’s hand is wide and warm, calloused just a little at the top of his palm, but fingers soft and strong. Elegant hands. Doctor’s hands. Will wraps his own little fingers around him and follows along.

He imagines, for a moment, what it would have been like had he met this man in another time and another place, if he would have looked twice at him or if he would have been preoccupied with silly childish things. He wonders if he even knows what silly childish things are, anymore.

But now, here and now, he thinks only of how they are walking side by side to get something to drink, because Will learned how to ask, in Thai, because Hannibal was pleased. He thinks only of that, and of how warm Hannibal’s hand is against his own sweaty palm.

It takes a great deal more in the man than he might have guessed, not to react. For weeks, they have kept each other at cautious distance - Will from fear, Hannibal from a feeling much the same. Unwilling to jeopardize the progress made in loosening the boy from his captivity, Hannibal resisted every impulse to stroke Will’s hair, to rest a hand against his arm, anything at all that so often the man thought might offer him comfort.

He knew it would not, and so to feel thin fingers against his own is yet another surprise from the boy who has already done so more times than Hannibal can count.

Hannibal wishes, distantly, that he might have once had Will’s resilience.

They find a little stand, catering to tourists along the river walk, and Hannibal offers the words to Will, for him to ask. He teaches him water - _náam_ \- and another - _khao niaow ma muang_ that Hannibal does not explain.

Will stands contented, smiling wide when he is handed the water first, drinking with relish and only barely remembering to leave some for Hannibal and offering it up. The water is almost sweet, delicious after so long outside in the heat. He turns only when Hannibal gestures for him to, and his eyes go wide with what is presented to him next. It looks like rice, with yellow curls of fruit atop, two spoons passed over as well, that Hannibal takes as they step away to let others approach, moving to the little wall by the river to sit as Will continues to regard this new treat with excitement and trepidation. 

Will regards the offering with amusing mistrust. “Rice as dessert?” he asks, turning his eyes to the man beside him. Hannibal just smiles, passes him a spoon and Will takes it up carefully before dipping just the tip into the sticky white rice and bringing it to his mouth to taste.

It is indescribable, dewy and sweet and delightfully heavy on his tongue. Will makes a sound, he is certain, and grins at Hannibal before he can even control the expression, before he can even think to. This tastes like heaven. Perhaps it is, because nothing else would explain it to Will. Nothing else would make sense.

“There is a phrase you will remember,” Hannibal muses. He starts to stand to fetch more water for them, but stops at the hand on his sleeve - the same as he did only a few weeks before. Will holds him fast, and defeated by Will’s insistent look, almost stern through his glasses, Hannibal sits again.

“Honesty,” Hannibal repeats, as Will chews a bit of mango from the dessert. “That is all I ask. All I need, for both our safety.”

Will nods, he hears, he offers Hannibal a spoonful of sticky rice, swollen thick with coconut milk. The man regards it, and with a flicker of movement in his jaw, turns towards the water. “It is yours.”

A languishing panic rises up, swells building and crashing into a spray against the bank of Hannibal's ribs, like the furrows in water drawn by the boats that pass them. If someone, anyone, right now were to ask Hannibal what he thinks he’s doing, he would not have an answer. He doesn’t know. The boy should have been brought to the embassy, whether he liked it or not, he should be somewhere, anywhere but here.

And to know, now, as much as he knows.

And to accept, now, what he has come to accept with a flushed smile.

_How many?_

Will continues to savor his dessert, eating it slowly and carefully, working around the rim of the cup to keep the rice even, then working inwards and carving it similarly. He offers it to Hannibal twice more before he accepts, relents, perhaps, and dips his own spoon into the rice to continue Will’s meticulous molding of the sweet treat.

Will smiles and watches Hannibal enjoy it as well, lips curling over his spoon before he licks his lips almost delicately to catch the last of the coconut against them.

Will doesn’t want to admit he’s getting sleepy, he doesn’t want to admit he’s probably too tired to walk back to the hotel. He just sits, curling his legs beneath him, and finishes his dessert, coaxing Hannibal to ‘help’ him with wide eyes and a delighted smile when he acquiesces, his own smile giving away how untrue his reluctance is.

They get more water, once they finish the rice, Will drinking slowly and heeding Hannibal to not drink it all at once, to let it settle before quenching his thirst again as they walk. And they do walk, they do start to, back to the hotel via the riverbank, to look at all the boats. For a while, Will points out the new things he’s learned, repeating them and smiling when he gets it right, but then his enthusiasm wanes, his steps grow slower and he holds the bottle of water with both hands against his chest as he blinks sleepily, trying to keep up. 

“Hannibal,” he calls, just enough to make the man pause. He doesn’t know how to ask, he’s too embarrassed to, but he looks up and parts his lips to try. “I -”

It would be nearly an hour back, longer with the speed the boy can barely maintain. Perhaps Hannibal pushed, perhaps he encouraged, without meaning to, for the boy to exert himself. After so long restrained in such small space, after weeks of rest and little movement, Hannibal imagines it was only pure adrenaline that got Will so far in the first place.

“ _Nuai_ ,” Hannibal tells him. “‘I’m tired.’”

Will repeats it, nearly swaying, but still his smile bubbles to the surface again. The surly resistance Hannibal would have expected in a teenager never found this one. How could it, when he did not have time enough to be a child, let alone?

“ _Nuai mark_ ,” Hannibal adds, stepping nearer with a hand out, again. “I’m very tired.’ We will find a taxi back.”

Will takes his hand, mumbling an apology and following Hannibal as they make their way further down the large main street. Cars and cars and bicycles and people, and Will is almost dizzy from it, stumbling once, and then again, before gripping Hannibal’s hand tight to right himself.

“ _Nuai mark_ ,” Will says, laughing quietly, and Hannibal watches him almost fondly before turning his head one way and another seeking for a taxi stand. He knows one should be two blocks over, but it is two blocks the boy has to walk to get there. He considers, sets his jaw and relaxes it, before moving to crouch, one knee to the ground, before the boy.

“I can carry you,” Hannibal tells him, and watches as Will blinks, lips parted in surprise and worry, squeezing against his hand again. He will not let himself be held against the man’s hip, nor against his chest. Hannibal does not allow himself to think of what profane associations the poor boy has with such positions, from things that should be gestures of comfort and gentleness.

With a sigh, he gestures behind himself, and reaches to take the bottle from Will so the boy can come around and wrap his arms around his neck for Hannibal to hoist him up this way, instead.

Will is light, ridiculously light, for his age - which Hannibal still does not know - still so little even despite the regular meals, and Hannibal does not need to do more than cross his arms beneath his bottom to hold him securely. Will murmurs apologies against him, hands clasped together and fidgeting against Hannibal’s collarbone.

“I’m just a little tired,” Will insists, “I can walk after a little while, I promise, you don’t have to carry me so far, I’m sorry.”

A few curious passing looks are sent their way now, Will’s age enough to make it a little unusual, Hannibal’s attire enough to make it something of a spectacle. Hannibal hums, when he feels Will avoid the looks and tuck his face lower, cheek against the man’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” Will murmurs again.

“Do not be sorry for taking what is offered - and given - freely,” Hannibal tells him. The walk ahead certainly seems longer now, but not insurmountable. A few blocks, until they reach a taxi stand. Perhaps less, if they can find a tuk-tuk instead. Just a little while, with Will pressed against his back, gangly legs dangling over his hips.

Until with the stand in sight, Hannibal feels the thin arms around his neck loosen. Until he feels how Will’s breath has slowed, despite the chaos of cars and humanity around them. Until the apologies quiet, somehow, into sleep.

And so Hannibal simply carries him onward, instead.

It becomes meditative, one step after another, an endurance that Hannibal weathers easily, used, so often, to worse and harder. Carrying a young boy across town is the least of his hardships. He does not need to adjust Will against himself often, just once in a while to push him up his back, but Will’s hands are still linked, cheek pressed warm to Hannibal’s shoulder, and he hangs comfortably against him, Hannibal’s arms hooked beneath skinny legs.

Block after block, street after street he carries the little boy to their hotel. The staff smile and wave to Hannibal, making gentle remarks about how they do the same for their kids, how they never grow too old for it, how sweet Will looks asleep, and that they hope they had a good day out in the city together.

Up in the elevator and to the room, Hannibal working the keycard from his pocket to buzz them in, sweating beneath his suit from carrying the boy, from the heat of the city itself. He carries Will back to their room, careful to turn and settle him back into the bed, watching as Will curls up and wriggles up to the pillow without waking.

Hannibal sighs, stays long enough to unlace Will’s shoes and remove them, long enough to cover him with a blanket and move to the bathroom to start the shower.

The door closed, Hannibal undresses. His clothes stick to him, his front where his chest has dampened with sweat, his back where Will pressed against him. The suit will need to be laundered before it can be worn again, and he makes a mental note to send it out in the morning through hotel services.

He makes another to pick up another few comics, perhaps a proper book, when he goes out in the morning.

He makes another to remind himself that he shouldn't be doing this.

Another that the longer this keeps on, the worse it will be when Will has to leave.

Another. Another. He meets his own eyes in the mirror, standing bare before it as hot water fills the room with steam. Is he, truly, so lonely as this? Seeking out the friendship of a boy several decades younger, for no other reason than because Hannibal sees himself in him. Has he always been so selfish?

When Hannibal can no longer hold his own gaze, he knows his answer, and steps into the waiting shower.

And yet, even the threat of compromise - of flight, back to America, of unsettling the fragile foundation of stability they have created - is not enough to remove from him the warmth Will's company provides. A kindred spirit, despite their years apart, and an understanding that few in the world have felt as they have. A curious boy, eager to learn, and Hannibal - apparently - just as eager to teach.

A few words in Thai.

A lesson in baroque music.

When the shower stops, he cuts his thoughts off at the pass.

This is his problem now.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"What do you do with the parts you remove?" Will ventures, taking a piece of carrot Hannibal offers him to crunch between his teeth._
> 
> _It is precisely the question Hannibal knew was coming. Precisely the one he has avoided, for long enough now. Precisely the wrong moment for it to be asked, as he begins to piece apart a cut of chicken to add to the curry, hands and knife sliding smooth in tandem, as though one in the same. His eyes lift, and hold, for a moment._
> 
> _“I eat them.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

Will devours the books Hannibal brings him. He presses his finger to the page for a while, returning to the rhythm of reading having had books denied him for so long. And within a few chapters, he happily curls up in the chair with his nose in the book, deaf to the world around him.

So Hannibal brings more books, brings magazines for Will to begin recognizing Thai written as well as practicing pronunciation with him. The boy seems to thrive on knowledge, much more aware, more awake, more alive. They walk when they can, together, Will still too scared to venture out on his own. They eat together. They build routines and settle into them.

When books are not enough, or when Will grows tired of practicing his understanding of the brisk language from watching the television, the questions begin. Hannibal wonders, some days, how he had ever thought the boy shy and quiet, when he is anything but that, now. Will asks everything openly, receives his answers with nods, or further questions. He accepts the information and adds it to his memory bank that grows more and more full by the day.

It is inevitable, perhaps, that Will’s mind would take him, again, to the questions Hannibal often wishes to avoid.

“The men you kill,” Will asks him one afternoon. Legs folded beneath himself on the bar stool as he leans on the counter, he watches Hannibal chop sweet peppers into immaculate thin slices for a curry. “What do you do with them?”

Hannibal glances upward, lips curving, and tilts his head in consideration. “You’ve answered your own question, I think.”

“But how?”

“You’ve seen,” Hannibal reminds him, not unkindly. Will sucks his bottom lip between his teeth, and lets it poke free a moment later.

“I want you to tell me.”

The older man sweeps a careful hand across the blade of his knife - his own, not those dull instruments that the hotel keeps - and the peppers plop into the simmering soup.

“When the fourth cervical vertebrae separates from the fifth,” he answers, “someone may be killed instantly, if the dislocation is severe enough. If the movement that pulls the bones free is not as drastic, paralysis occurs. The context of the injury depends upon the situation in which it occurs.”

Will’s eyes narrow in thought and he rocks forward a little on the stool, considering. Hannibal had not paralyzed the man that he had killed in front of Will. The twist had been brutal, quick. Will still remembers the sound of it, the dull thud of the man hitting the ground, somehow louder than the bass from the club below.

He feels a tightness swell in his chest, but it is not pity, far from it. Anger. Anger and nausea and that cold terror he had lived with for months and months because of that man. Because of his dirty hands and heavy breath and sickening weight. Because he believed in regularly testing his product for quality and use.

"And if they're paralyzed?" Will asks softly, eyes up again. "What then?"

Hannibal touches his tongue to his lips in thought, studying the food, and beyond that the boy who watches him, entirely unafraid. Brave and wrathful, as Hannibal himself had been since the same age. Younger. The man returns to his work, knife slipping steadily over a wide carrot.

“There is a belief that one’s body must be intact, at disposition, to be in peace after death. It is the reason that certain cultures and faiths do not allow embalming. Autopsy. Organ donation,” he says. “By removing a part of one’s physical being, the spirit is disturbed from rest. Doomed, then, to wander uneasy, seeking out its parts that cannot be found.”

He plunks a few slivers of vegetable into the curry.

“One might say there is a justice, in giving an endless distress to those who have caused suffering in the lives of so many others. They do not deserve the grace of an untroubled eternity.”

Will’s eyes have widened, now, bright, seeking quickly over Hannibal’s face before he swallows, directs his eyes to the pot boiling on the stove. The smell is complex, aromatic, spicy and soothed just a little with coconut. Will knows he will take his time eating it, even though there will be seconds if he wants them, even though it will be in the fridge for later, for whenever he chooses.

He is too used to savoring his food if given the time, because there might just not be more, even here.

"What do you do with the parts you remove?" Will ventures, taking a piece of carrot Hannibal offers him to crunch between his teeth.

It is precisely the question Hannibal knew was coming. Precisely the one he has avoided, for long enough now. Precisely the wrong moment for it to be asked, as he begins to piece apart a cut of chicken to add to the curry, hands and knife sliding smooth in tandem, as though one in the same. His eyes lift, and hold, for a moment.

“I eat them.”

Will snorts, a quick childish thing, and looks up at Hannibal over the top of his glasses. He has become accustomed to wielding the things almost like one would a fan, turning just so to cover his vision without covering his eyes, looking over the frames, under them, just past.

Glasses suit him.

He shakes his head and brings up a hand to rest his cheek against, still watching Hannibal work.

"What do you really do with them?" he asks.

Hannibal’s smile widens a little, and then fades as he answers. “The first time was an act of anger. Retribution, for a crime similarly committed, and far more cruelly than the death that found them. It did not seem enough, to only die, and so in vengeance, I repaid them as they deserved. After that -”

He pauses, to set the chicken to a heated pan with a hiss.

“I suppose that I developed a taste for it,” he admits. “And if it prevents them from the reward of an afterlife, more’s the better. Let them haunt me. Their parts will never be returned.”

There is stillness from the boy, and before he can react Hannibal speaks, tone hardening. “They are beneath animals. There is intelligence to swine. Kindness in cattle. Compassion in creatures to care for their young and protect them, and yet we devour them. It would be an insult to the animals we eat to compare these men - and would that there were another word for them - to those beasts who sustain us.”

Will swallows, eyes quick to the pan as the meat sizzles on it, unfocusing, before he brings them unblinking back to Hannibal's. A guarantee, in consumption, that no part be ever retrieved, by any ghost or curious seeker. A reminder of power from the powerless. Still, the thought turns Will’s stomach a little, taught from youth that it is wrong, ungodly, inhuman.

But Hannibal's words are hypnotically compelling. Surely consuming an animal is as inhuman - inhumane - as consuming a person? Surely they are higher beings, in intelligence and gentleness and empathy, all, than the monsters who sell children into unspeakable cruelties for coin.

"Have you ever -" Will considers the phrasing, looks to the pan again. "Have I -"

“No,” Hannibal answers, without reservation. “Not once. And I will not.”

“But you -”

“Yes,” he says. “Apart from anything I have made for you. That is not your burden to carry, and I would not set it on your shoulders. Chicken, tonight. Beef, last. Often no meat at all, and not until recently, when your stomach was better prepared for it.”

He lets the chicken cook, and washes his hands, toweling them as he turns to face Will, expression somber, perhaps, but there is no tension in it - anger or fear or anything but a calm uncertainty. It would be enough, he wagers, to send most fleeing. It would be enough to undo any number of relationships built on studier ground than the one they have.

It should be enough, now, and Hannibal’s throat clicks when he swallows.

Will is speechless, sitting quietly on the stool and allowing his mind to work over and through the situation, the admission. He had asked Hannibal to be honest with him. He had asked, and had found the man to be, unfailingly so. He breathes quietly, taking in the aroma of the curry, the chicken not yet added beside. He wonders.

"What does it taste like?" he asks softly. "Is the meat bitter?"

Hannibal steadies the sigh that comes, a dizzying relief that the boy is not weeping, fleeing, angry or frightened. Will has proven himself fearless, but Hannibal supposes that after one has known the worst kind of terror, most things pale by comparison.

“At times,” Hannibal answers. “Fear - adrenaline, really - can make it so. Other times, it is curiously sweet. It depends greatly on circumstance, and what is taken.”

Will settles low across the counter, mouth behind his hands, voice muffled as he asks, “What do you take?”

“The kidneys, often, and a portion of the liver. For certain dishes, the stomach works well. At times a tougher meat is desired, and the heart suffices,” Hannibal says, softly, returning to the pan to tip the chicken to the curry. “Will you check the rice? I am nearly through.”

For a few moments, Will doesn’t move, but then he obediently slides from the chair and moves into the kitchen with Hannibal, just past him, to check the rice cooker. Will can feel the tension almost trembling out of the man, the admission taking a lot from him, and Will considers that this could be the first time the man has ever shared this ritual with anyone.

Will wonders if he will ever be able to share his own secrets as bravely.

He doubts it.

"It's good," he says, closing the lid once more for the rice to stay hot. He stands still a moment longer before stepping close to Hannibal and pressing his forehead softly against his side.

Hannibal pauses, arm uplifted where he stands stirring. The boy against him tilts his head, nuzzling gentle, barely touching, against Hannibal’s ribs. The acceptance in the movement, the bravery to stand so near to the man’s side, and after the words exchanged, stills Hannibal’s heart for a moment. Just a moment, before he switches the spoon to his other hand, and slowly settles a hand to Will’s hair, stroking soft, clean curls between his fingers.

“I think, perhaps, we are both lucky to have found each other,” Hannibal says after a moment. A quiet confession, but no less honest than the ones before. A relinquishment to words of the thoughts that have filled the man, unspoken, for weeks together. Where he provides the boy something like a home, stability and safety and sustenance, Will has begun to provide him a company that Hannibal did not know he sought.

And an understanding, and acceptance, that he did not ever imagine he would find.

Will doesn’t move from him, eyes closing at the feeling of gentle fingers in his hair. It has been so long since someone has touched him this way, so long since he has let anyone close enough to. He feels loved. He feels worthy of it. Hannibal's words make him smile.

Will goes only when Hannibal asks him to set the table for them both, taking two deep bowls to spoon the rice into. He passes them one by one to Hannibal to pour the curry over the top before taking them to the table and returning only then for cutlery and glasses to set.

Will feels at home. He wonders if his actual home felt this good. He can't remember. 

The rice is left to warm, the curry to simmer, in case Will wants seconds. Hannibal allows the kitchen to remain, for now, untidied, in favor of joining the boy while they eat. Smoothing his tie, and slipping fingers to unbutton his waistcoat, Hannibal settles to the small table across from Will.

Since they speak openly, now, both settled enough for tonight - Hannibal, open, and Will, engaged - that after a little while, Hannibal regards him. “May I ask a question, in return for yours? _Quid pro quo_ ,” he murmurs. “‘This for that.’”

Around a spoonful of curry, spiced only enough to be flavorful and sweet, Will nods, once, his cheeks already flushed.

“Where did you live, before? If you recall,” Hannibal allows, without judgment for the awareness that Will may not.

Will licks his lips and tilts his head, considering. There are things he remembers. He knows there are things he has forgotten, but having forgotten them doesn’t know what they are. He knows he was taken when he was with his dad, but he can’t remember his mom at all. He knows he was wearing his favourite red sweater the day he disappeared but he can’t remember what mall he was in. It’s strange, like piecing a puzzle together with some parts missing.

“By the water,” he says, and that he is sure of. “The house wasn’t big, but we had a dog,” Will frowns. “Two dogs, we had two dogs.”

He knows Hannibal wants to know the country, but Will feels that tightness in his throat, that muffling, like a palm pressed hard against his lips to keep him quiet. He can feel his breathing pick up, and shakes his head to shuffle that memory away. He doesn’t need it. It doesn’t belong here.

“The trees didn’t change color in fall,” Will adds, apologetic eyes up at Hannibal before he takes up his spoon to continue his dinner. “I always wished they would.”

Hannibal does not watch him, as he struggles with himself, but he listens. The tightening of his lungs, the shortness of his breath, and then slowly, easing again. He is proud of Will for that, for learning this too - that there is darkness there, and that it can be seen without being consumed by it.

“Somewhere warm, then,” Hannibal acknowledges. Will’s accent, if he ever had one, is too far gone to discern any more than that he is American, the memories smoothed as clear as his voice. “I have always lived in places with winter, leaves that change and wither, and leave the trees barren. Snow, often a great deal of it.”

He, too, works away a distant memory at this, and raises a soft smile to his little companion. “I prefer the warmth, I think.”

Will smiles back, warmed by the acceptance, grateful that more information is not pushed from him about this. Maybe one day. Maybe once the hands no longer appear to cover his mouth and nose when he thinks of what home used to be. Maybe then.

“I’d love to see the snow,” Will says. “I can’t even imagine it. Like opening a freezer and scraping up the ice, but everywhere.”

Will sucks his bottom lip into his mouth and releases it again, scooping more rice with his spoon.

“You will,” Hannibal tells him. The same calm assurance as when he eases Will’s food anxieties, when he speaks low to him to settle his heart in crowds, when he quiets whispered apologies for making a mess or waking to a nightmare.

“Do you know your age?” Hannibal asks, after a moment more. “Or the age you were, then.”

Will lifts his eyes to meet Hannibal’s and watches him for a long time before swallowing and slipping them to look at the table instead.

“What date is it?” Will asks him softly, turning his spoon in his meal without eating it, almost bored if he wasn’t concentrating so hard on that one simple motion. Turn and turn and turn again, over and over.

“2015,” Hannibal tells him, giving Will a moment before adding the month. “August.”

Will’s eyes widen briefly and he swallows, blinking down at his meal as his lips purse and relax, over and over in gentle pressure.

“I was eleven then,” Will replies at length. “Just after my birthday, we were at the mall for dad to get something for the dogs.” Will sighs, sets his spoon down and rests both elbows on the table, his face held against his fists. “April, 2013.”

“Breathe,” Hannibal says, on only a breath himself. “I know that you can. Do not let them convince you that you cannot. Prove them wrong, Will, now, and inhale, slowly.”

It comes rattling, from behind small hands fisted so tight that his knuckles are white, but it comes. Again, when Hannibal bids him do so. His breath falls warm over his fingers. Again.

“They cannot take that from you now,” he tells Will. “Do not let their hold remain.” Though his silverware had stilled, when Will steadies himself, Hannibal resumes eating, enforcing normalcy - of the panic, expected, of the return, just as certain.

Thirteen, then.

And eleven, at the time.

Hannibal’s jaw pulls tight and then eases, as he wishes he had stayed to parcel the man to shreds.

“What were their names? Your dogs,” Hannibal says. “Can you remember? For me.”

“Um,” Will swallows, sniffs, though his eyes are dry, and sits up again, eyes still down, cheeks pink where he had pressed his hands against them, and blotchy from holding himself together, composed, now that he knows how long he has been here, forgotten, unfound. Until Hannibal.

“Winston and Maggie,” Will says at last, and his lips tilt in a smile that he raises to Hannibal. “Both were mutts, we had no idea what breed they were. They were really big.”

Will looks away again, watching his curry blur in his vision before he blinks and it clears again. He takes up his spoon again, determined to eat despite how hard his stomach clenches against it.

“Do you like dogs?”

Approval, in Hannibal’s eyes, as the boy resumes his meal, as he overcomes this hurdle, one of countless before and spanning seemingly endless before him. Gracefully managed, resilient and beautiful in his bravery. Hannibal does not need to make himself smile now, as one lingers long, gathering the muscles beneath his eyes.

“I’ve enjoyed the ones I’ve met,” he says. “I have never had my own.”

“Do you like cats more?”

Hannibal blinks, and breathes a little laugh. “They better suit my temperament, I think, but I have known just as few. I do not have any pets, I have not -” A pause, a breath drawn again, as Hannibal recalls, “There were swans, in the water.”

Will blinks, surprise and bright curiosity warming his features again. “You had swans?”

Will can’t imagine a house so large that there would be swans, there. He knows they live in parks, they live by lakes and near forests. They are beautiful, wild things. He is surprised anyone can keep them at all.

“Did you live in a castle?” he asks, blushing when he realizes how stupid it sounds, from someone who should know better, and he frowns, apologetic.

“Yes,” Hannibal says, his voice curiously tight, as if distracted by his own words. “A very long time ago.” He draws a breath to feel it fill his throat, his lungs, stretch his ribs beneath skin that feels seamed a little too tight, as he instructed Will to do minutes before. “They were frightening creatures. Lovely at a distance, but when they gave chase, their wings were wider than -”

He stops. Gently, stops, and sets fork against his empty dish. Will watches rapt, eyes wide as the frames around them, and Hannibal moves to stand and take his bowl aside, leaving Will’s for him to finish.

“Was it beautiful?” Will asks. A frustration snags at him, that his own life he can’t remember well, but stories - he remembers stories, read to him, of lords and ladies and their castles, besieged by armies or dragons or both.

Without turning towards him, quietly washing his bowl clean, Hannibal makes a small sound. “Yes.”

Will’s brow creases. “But you said you slept -”

“In an orphanage.”

“Why -”

“A story for another night. Finish your curry.”

Will abruptly stops asking, head down, chastened, and spoon working over the rice before he starts to eat properly. Meals are still little for him, he can rarely finish a full bowl of anything, but he valiantly tries. He accepts Hannibal’s allowance for him to leave his leftovers in the fridge for another time, and he always finishes them. But he tries, now, to finish all he has.

He thinks of swans, huge birds that are almost as mythical to his mind as dragons and witches, but are just as real as heroes - as Hannibal is. He thinks of his dogs. He can barely remember his dogs, but he knows that both were huge, that he could wrap both his arms around them and only barely manage to touch his fingers together as he hugged them close. He feels his eyes sting when he realizes he can imagine his dogs but not his dad. Not his home beyond flicks and flashes.

Will manages most of what is in the bowl before taking it up to Hannibal, past him to the fridge to keep until the next day. He takes up a towel to dry the dishes Hannibal has washed and sets them away. Another routine, another comfortable habit now, between them. Domestic. Familiar.

Without thinking, Will leans against Hannibal again, as before, as he moves, a need for balance and reassurance from his touch.

It is Hannibal, now, who tenses at the unexpected touch, a lightning snap through his muscles that passes through just as quickly. Pulled back to now, from the corridors where he wandered a moment before, he eases water across the pan with his palm, and rinsing it clean, hands it to Will. Without moving from him, the little weight against his side, Hannibal takes the towel when Will is done with it, to dry his hands, too.

“I apologize,” he says, “for being sharp. We each war against what the other cannot see, knowing only its shape by the shadow it casts.”

Setting his hand in Will’s hair once more, smoothing wild boyish curls back from his face, never across his eyes, never near his cheeks or mouth, careful. Always careful.

“Thank you for eating,” Hannibal murmurs, and his throat clicks as he swallows. “For speaking, and for listening.”

Will looks up at him and just smiles. It seems enough. Hannibal doesn’t ask for more, and Will doesn’t need an apology. They part when Hannibal gently pushes between Will’s shoulders to send him to brush his teeth, and Hannibal continues wiping down the counters and stove.

The classical music doesn’t play 24 hours a day anymore, just in the mornings when Will is alone and needs the white noise in the background, or when Hannibal is cooking. It’s quiet, now, as Will watches himself in the mirror and brushes, just the rhythmic sound against his skull before he spits, the swirl of water as he rinses. Common. Normal. Safe.

He turns the light on in the bedroom before he turns it off in the bathroom.

Will is in bed by the time Hannibal goes to the bathroom to shower, closing the door with a quiet snap behind him. Will listens to the water run, to the movement of a body beneath it, and imagines how it would feel to have Hannibal’s hands spread from Will’s head down his back, wide and strong and barely calloused. He wonders what it would feel like to be held against him...

Will swallows. Stops wondering.

Too many memories swill in his head to allow this new thought to be as pleasant as he wants it to be. As he knows it would be. Will curls himself beneath the blankets as he always does, just the top of his head visible above them, and waits. The shower stops and Hannibal moves around the bathroom quietly, brushing his own teeth, combing his hair with his fingers to settle it.

When the door opens, the room fills with the pleasant smell of the shampoo he uses, that Will has slowly started to sneak in with his own, so the smell lingers. Will tracks his steps around the bed and to the closet, from there to the door, the entrance light left on, always, now, as the others are turned off so Will can see beyond the door into their hotel room at large and not worry.

The light is turned off in the bathroom, the bed dips as Hannibal climbs into it and wishes Will good night, as he always does, and Will waits for him to settle, his breathing to soothe in rest but not sleep. Only when he’s counted twenty of his own short breaths does he move. He unfurls, gentle, and turns to face Hannibal and the space between them. He pauses there, licks his lips, and then shifts closer, just a little, then a little more. He presses his forehead between Hannibal’s shoulders and sighs, hoping the tension leaves the man from where it has turned his form rigid.

“Good night,” Will whispers.

The boy’s breath is warm against Hannibal’s spine, and he makes a small sound in response, just a hum of affirmation - that Will is heard, felt, acknowledged in his boldness. Hannibal does not move, he will not throughout the night, and though he will sleep poorly for the effort, it is better than scaring Will to tears or worse.

Each hour, he wakes, to keep himself still. Each hour he wakes when the small movements of sleep against his back stir him. Each hour Hannibal tries not to think of the skinny legs that curl against his own, the adolescent arms that tuck between Will’s chest and Hannibal’s back, as the boy fits his body snug against the larger one beside.

And when, in the night, Will slips his arm over Hannibal’s middle, fingers curling in his shirt, Hannibal does not sleep at all.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Will returns his gaze to the sutures, forces himself to watch as Hannibal continues to stitch himself, hand resting as relaxed as it can against the table as he works. Every day, Will is astounded by Hannibal's bravery, by his skill. This is the first day he has ever worried for him, the first day he has seen how vulnerable and human he can be._
> 
> _And even in that, so strong that Will cannot fathom it. He swallows again._
> 
> _"I want to come with you, next time."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

It is the first time that Hannibal scares him.

The door bangs shut loud enough to startle Will not only awake, but from the bed. Shaking, blanket pulled around him like a shield, he stands in the darkness and thrusts out a hand for the lamp beside. The glare blinds him, and he squints against it enough to see a shadow move across the doorway, through the light that snaps on there as well.

A hissed word, in a language Will has never heard, tells him at least that the shadow is Hannibal.

It sounds nothing like the man that Will has come to know.

Water runs in the kitchen sink, and when Will is sure the ground is still beneath his feet, he steps closer to the bedroom doorway. Hannibal’s coat has been dropped across the kitchen table, his bag to the floor beside, and his shoulders hunch over the sink where he stands.

“Go to bed,” he tells Will, flat.

Will wraps his arms around himself, but doesn’t return to the bedroom, looking at the coat instead. At the bag.

Hannibal is never messy. He will take his time to hang a suit even if he’s swaying with exhaustion. Something is very wrong. Will feels the sick feeling crawl up his throat and tries to swallow it down. He steps forward quietly, again, and stops when Hannibal hisses another unknown word and adjusts the water in the sink.

“What happened?” Will asks him gently.

“Will -”

“Tell me.”

A reverberation in the boy’s words holds his voice higher, a childish alarm that draws a look across Hannibal’s shoulder. He is pale, and anger darkens his eyes. He averts them again, to keep it from lingering too long on Will.

Hannibal looks back to the sink, where blood pulses out pink beneath the running tap. The cut is deep, deeper than Hannibal first thought, when fueled by adrenaline he managed himself through the city to return. He can see, now, the thin layer of skin, the white further down, not to muscle but enough that a hospital would not be out of line, to anyone else.

He isn’t anyone else.

And he doesn’t know whose blood has soaked his shirt more, his own or the man he butchered.

“A mild injury,” Hannibal says, steadying his voice. “Return to bed. Please.”

Will doesn’t return to bed, he steps closer. Close enough to see that the black smears over Hannibal’s shirt and neck are not black, enough that he can see what Hannibal is doing over the sink. He swallows, thick and audible and turns away. A few seconds later, he’s gone from Hannibal’s side and the man releases a breath.

More cursing, sloshing water that will need to be mopped up later, and then Will, again, holding out a soft shirt.

“Will this help?” he asks, voice wavering, nervous, but he looks at Hannibal when the man turns to him, even angry, and he takes just half a step back before holding his ground. “To staunch it? It’s all I have, but I can get another one. I can tie it up for you if you need… if you hold it over your head it will help -”

Hannibal does not ask how a boy, who has spent two years living in a single room, knows that. He can imagine, well enough, and the thought fills his throat with bile and a sudden, savage pleasure in what he’s done tonight, knife or otherwise. He lifts his hand from his arm, and takes the shirt. Will looks away from the cut, but waits, trembling, waits and watches from the corners of his eyes as Hannibal - with hand and teeth - pulls the little shirt around his arm. With an elbow, then, the water turns off, and Hannibal raises his arm above his heart, taking steady steps towards the table.

“In the bathroom, beneath the sink,” he says. “There is a brown bottle with a white cap. Beside it, a small leather bag. Bring both to me. Please.”

Will nods, quick to move and happy to have something to do. He finds the bottle and bag easily, everything meticulous in their rooms and always in their place. Both are heavy, and Will gathers them in his arms before returning. His blanket lays forgotten on the floor of the bedroom where he had let it fall from his shoulders, and he makes a note to pick it up before Hannibal comes back to bed. He sets what Hannibal asked for on the table before him and perches on one of the chairs beside, not touching him, not bothering, but watching how Hannibal’s face twists in pain, how his lip snarls up in displeasure before he sighs and settles that expression as well.

“I’m sorry,” Will whispers. “I didn’t mean to make you angry. Do you want me to open the bag for you?”

“I am not angry with you,” Hannibal says. “The bottle first, please.”

Will nods and uncaps it, dropping the top to the table when his hands shake, releasing it to Hannibal. He pours it against the shirt, soaking it dark, and mindless of the clear, strong-smelling fluid that spills across the table beneath. Will watches, blood blooming red and pink as it fans across the wet cloth, and under his breath Hannibal curses again.

It takes him a moment to steady, the color gone from his face. “Rubbing alcohol,” he tells Will. Always teaching, compelled somehow, for ends that Hannibal knows not, to leave this boy with the knowledge of how to survive. “To sanitize the wound, and keep it from infection.”

“I need you to open the bag, and then wash your hands. Within is a needle, curved, and thread. Do not prick yourself,” Hannibal instructs, his voice hushed, in urgency and blood loss both. “I will need you to thread it for me, please.”

Please. Always please.

Even now, a request, rather than a demand.

Will nods, understanding, and moves to do as he's told. Bag open first. Then up to wash his hands at the sink, mindless of the smeared blood and pink drips all over the counter.

When he comes back, Will reaches into the bag to find the curved needle and the thread beside it. He has never threaded a needle before, but he understands how. He stays on his knees on his chair, bent forward to make sure he doesn't drop anything to the floor as he stills his hands and works the thread through the little hole where it will stay, secure. It takes several attempts, with Hannibal panting in pain beside him, and Will knows he has to hurry but he finds he only manages when he is calm. And calm takes several deep breaths and a quiet internal monologue - in Hannibal’s voice - telling him to breathe, to try again. Once it's threaded, Will reaches for the bottle, pouring a little onto his hands and using his fingers to spread it over the needle and some of the thread - to sterilize it.

Then he gives it to Hannibal. The man’s eyes linger on him a moment more, a look between appreciation and amazement, and he offers his arm out to Will, taking the needle and suture with his other hand.

“I’m sorry that you had to see this,” Hannibal says, as Will’s fingers unknot the shirt from around the man’s arm. It remains beneath, catching the blood still issuing forth, as Hannibal rests his arm atop it. With a stern set of his jaw, teeth tight enough behind closed lips to steady the insistent trembling in his arm, Hannibal sets needle to skin. “You should go,” Hannibal says, before he begins, but when Will doesn’t move, there is scant enough time to argue. His skin stretches, obscene and gruesome, before the needle punctures it with a pop, and the suture hisses through. Each snap of skin across the point draws a grimace, lines alongside Hannibal’s eyes, but he remains stoically silent from any more cursing or frustration.

“A knife,” he murmurs. “It should not have surprised me as it did. One should always assume, and act as if it is held in hand before it truly is.”

Will says nothing, he watches as the man he has come to trust, the man he owes his life, stitches himself back together. He feels dizzy, eyes wide from seeing all the blood, nostrils flared at the odd, unusual smell. He is trembling and only knows when his knuckles knock against the table and he folds his hands between his thighs, pressing them flat together. He wonders how many times Hannibal has been cut, he wonders how often someone is armed. No one had been armed against them at the house, no one had much need, they were all too little to be worth a knife or a gun.

No, when Will met both, they were used for 'play', not for defense.

He swallows.

"How many?" he asks instead.

Hannibal lifts his eyes, to watch Will watching him, and then gently gathers the thread between his fingers. In patient movements, piercing skin and pulling suture, drawing fresh trickles of blood where the needle breaks through, Hannibal begins to gather his skin together again. Tight enough to close, not so tight as to pucker, he says softly, “Even spacing, even pressure. Too loose, and the wound will reopen. Too tight, and you will trap inside it agents of infection, at worst, and at best, create a thicker scar than needed.”

Will’s throat clicks.

“Near to the edge of the skin, perhaps half the width of your smallest fingernail,” Hannibal murmurs. “A smaller distance than that, and you risk tearing the skin, further away, and the pain is greater.” Hannibal’s jaw flickers. “Only two,” he says.

Will’s eyes flick to Hannibal's, squinting a little without his glasses.

"It is never only," he tells Hannibal softly, making sure the man looks at him before nodding, just once. "You saved two."

Will returns his gaze to the sutures, forces himself to watch as Hannibal continues to stitch himself, hand resting as relaxed as it can against the table as he works. Every day, Will is astounded by Hannibal's bravery, by his skill. This is the first day he has ever worried for him, the first day he has seen how vulnerable and human he can be.

And even in that, so strong that Will cannot fathom it. He swallows again.

"I want to come with you, next time."

“No.”

The answer is immediate, no louder than his voice when he was explaining how to suture. Will sits up higher on his knees, hands fisted on his thighs. “But -”

“No,” Hannibal says, again, a little firmer. “I appreciate your offer, Will. You are braver than you yet realize.”

“Why?” Will asks, brows furrowed, lips a thin line. “You got hurt, you didn’t see him, maybe I could have.”

He drops his eyes to the wound again, Hannibal nearly finished in stitching it closed, and hums gently. He feels entirely light headed, a little sick. But he doesn’t move, and he doesn’t look away and he doesn’t back down from his words.

“You are correct. For as long as I have spent doing this,” Hannibal says, “I was hurt. It is dangerous, Will, there is no reason for you to be there.”

“I could watch for -”

“You will not.” The words are harder, now. “There is no reason for it, and I will not risk it. I will not risk your safety, nor my focus in worrying for it.”

The last thread slithers through his skin, and in a precise balance of the needle as an extra finger, Hannibal begins to loop the knot closed at both ends. Blood runs in rivulets from the needle marks, but the flow has stopped. Beneath his arm, the shirt is soaked with red and pink wetness, spread to the glass tabletop and shining in the low lights.

“I took you from there,” Hannibal finally says, when he releases his concentration and slumps back into his seat. “I will not bring you back.”

Will sits a moment longer, pouting and upset, before sliding from the chair and leaving Hannibal alone again. When he returns, it is with a clean towel from the bathroom and a glass of water that he holds out for Hannibal to take. Will knows the man needs more than water, but Will doesn’t know what. He doesn’t know what to get him, how to help. He doesn’t want the words to sink in that he should not go back, that he is not ready, that he would do more harm than good.

In truth, what good _can_ he do? Weak and little as he is? What could he possibly do but distract and hope he can fight his way free if someone takes the bait.

He passes Hannibal the towel next, for him to wipe the blood up on his arm, to press more rubbing alcohol against the cut to sanitize and clean it. He doesn’t sit down again, just stands next to Hannibal and watches.

“I want to be like you,” he whispers.

Hannibal stops himself from saying no again. The instinct is there - to push Will away from this, to finally act on finding a capable caretaker for him, to get him away from what will unalterably change him into something he is not…

But who is Hannibal, of everyone, to say that he is not already.

That sleepless thoughts of vengeance do not consume him. That he would not delight in the life shaped around that pursuit. That he could not continue to grow and become as capable at this as he has proven to be everything else. Hannibal survived, and now flourishes. And after bringing the boy closer, daily, rather than pushing him away, rather than protest again, Hannibal merely reaches up for him, to stroke his hair from his face.

“Why,” Hannibal asks, watching Will from beneath his own messy hair. “Tell me why, when you could live somewhere with a family, a home. When you would know that I am here, the risk my own, doing what must be done. When your life might be quiet, dedicated to study, remarkable boy, tell me - why?”

Will leans into the palm against him and brings his own hand up to hold it there, cold from how much blood Hannibal has lost, heavy from the effort it takes him to hold it.

“Because they took that from me,” Will says. “They took away my dad, I don’t know where he is. I don’t know if he knows where I am or if he’s even around to know where I am. They took me when I was little and wanted to keep me ‘til I wasn’t, and then I would be dead.” Will trembles and watches Hannibal as the other just blinks at him, lips parted to interrupt before Will keeps going, words pouring from him so fast he can’t stop them.

“You saved me. You took me from there and brought me here and you didn’t give me up because it would have been easier. You didn’t. And you have been patient and gentle and you teach me and you care. And until the night you came in and killed that man I did not think I would ever go outside again. But you saved me, and now I do. I want to do that for others, I want others to know that they don’t have to die in a filthy bed being called things that are untrue. I want to do what you did for me.”

A breath, short, falls from Hannibal’s mouth. He can feel his heart, beating heavy beneath the stitches in his forearm, he can feel it in his throat and he can hear it in his ears and it is too late.

Too late to leave this boy at the embassy, and wish him well.

Too late to send him to a fosterage that even if proved a welcome home, would be destructively distant from the only life left in this boy’s mind.

Too late to return, nightly, to working alone and in ugliness, and snuff out the little light that Will has brought warm beside Hannibal.

Hannibal stands, thumb stroking slow over the heat of Will’s cheeks, burning bright as embers with the fire of his words. He lets his arm lower, dripping to the hardwood floor, and it is only in the moment that Hannibal feels Will’s tension slip from his skin like water, that he tugs the boy gently near. Against his chest, holding him loose enough that he could pull away, but holding him there all the same.

“Not for a time,” Hannibal whispers to his hair. “You understand, they will kill them if they think it will save themselves, they will kill them if they think it will allow an escape. They will kill you or me in an instant to preserve themselves and so you must learn first, Will. Do you understand?”

Will nods against him, quick and shaky and wraps his arms around the man’s middle, uncaring for the blood that seeps into his shirt from pressing so close, uncaring that they are both filthy and exhausted and that Hannibal should probably go to a hospital. Will won’t tell him to, he can’t. Will can’t find words for anything at that moment.

He just leans into Hannibal and listens to his heart beating quick in his chest, still there, still alive. He will learn. He will learn everything Hannibal tells him to, he will practice his Thai and start to get stronger, he will eat better and learn to work with a knife, he will run, he will do push-ups and sleep more and not wet the bed. He will grow and he will become and he will save lives, like Hannibal does.

“You need to lie down,” Will mumbles against him, pulling back and relishing the way Hannibal’s palm slides over his hair to let him. “You lost a lot of blood. What can I do?”

Hannibal ducks his head to regard the mess, and manages a pale smile. “I will need to buy you a new shirt, tomorrow.”

With a laugh caught on his breath, Will shakes his head. “Now. What can I do now?”

“Start the shower, please,” Hannibal tells him. “We will leave our clothes upon the bathroom floor for tonight, and dispose of them tomorrow. While I bathe, change - and if I may displace you, rest here on the couch until I have washed and dressed."

Will nods, eyes up and bright before he reluctantly pulls away and trots to the bathroom to turn on the light, to turn on the water for Hannibal, as he had asked. He goes to pick up the blanket from the floor and dumps it back on the bed, finds Hannibal’s sleep pants and briefs and puts them at the end of the bed for him.

Will can change in the other room, he can wait. He can do anything.

When he comes back, Hannibal is pressing a hand against his eyes, but smiles when he sees the boy. Will turns his head towards the room and Hannibal goes, another gentle brush against his hair as he does, and Will shivers.

“Thank you,” Hannibal tells him, peeling loose his tie as he goes. It sloughs to the floor, and as he begins to work his shirt open with his viable hand, he pushes the door closed with his heel behind.

He is grateful for the blood loss. Grateful that it fuzzes his thoughts to the color of television static, fills his ears with a hum, to drown out the small voice that begs to know why he would agree to this. Because he can, Hannibal wagers with it. Because Will wishes for it, and as Hannibal would not be dissuaded from his duties, so too it is with Will. Because he is a bright and clever thing, and the ones that they save will listen to Will before they do Hannibal.

And if he never again has to see little hands fist in terror and eyes widen when Hannibal steps towards them, it will be too soon.

He leaves his clothes, as promised, in a pile upon the floor, and washes the blood free from where it sticks flaking to his skin. His own. Another’s. It hardly matters. And it matters not at all when Hannibal - dressed and dry and resisting tremors - opens the door to the bedroom to welcome Will back.

Settling to the edge of the bed, a hand against his face, Hannibal murmurs, “You will forgive me, I hope, if I am unable to wake to prepare breakfast tomorrow. You may call for room service from below, or seek something in the refrigerator.” A pause. “There is fruit. And bread.”

Will just nods, exhaustion catching up to him again, now that the adrenaline has worn off from the unexpected awakening. He had cleaned the kitchen as best he could while Hannibal was in the shower, he had rinsed the shirt and used it to clean up the alcohol and blood, to wipe down the table and the counter and wash the sink with dish soap and clumsy fingers. He had left his shirt and the bloodied one in the sink, squeezed as dry as he could get them. 

He watches Hannibal sit as he is, dizzy and exhausted and sick, swaying and catching his balance against the bed behind him. Will doesn’t offer to help him get into bed, but he scrambles to get into it first to potentially support the man if he falls. The damaged arm is the side Hannibal usually sleeps on, and with a groan he lays on his back instead, his free hand up to press over his eyes as he swallows and tries to relax into sleep.

Will moves only close enough to breathe soft against him, he does not touch.

Hannibal does, instead, as much a comfort to himself as the boy at his side. Weakened fingers pet through long curls, shaggy despite being combed. They twist around his touch, stretch long and slink tight again, little strokes without pressure or insistence, without expectation or demand.

The bed shifts, softly, as Will inches closer, fighting his own impulses, giving into them - he doesn’t know but Hannibal’s chest is warm when Will rests his cheek against it, in the nook of Hannibal’s arm.

“You might have saved me tonight,” Hannibal murmurs, his voice a low, dulcet rumble against Will’s ear. “I meant what I said. You are braver than you yet realize. Fearless, even when facing fear.” He lowers his arm, to rest a hand against Will’s shoulder. “I owe you a debt.”

Will just wriggles against him, embarrassed by the praise but warmed by it nonetheless. He can hear Hannibal’s tone slowing to a slur, and concentrates on the beating of his heart against him, the warmth of his hand against Will’s shoulder. Will can’t remember the last time he had allowed himself to be touched so, can’t remember the last time he had willingly crawled into another’s space, if he had ever. He supposes as a child he was more open, he was more willing to allow people into his space and hug them without fear of wrong touches and groping fingers.

There are none here.

He feels so comfortable against Hannibal, he doesn’t want to move.

“You don’t owe me anything,” Will tells him quietly. “Just… come back. Until you teach me and I can come with you, come back here, okay?”

The gentle insistence warms a smile to the man beside him. Hannibal has been many things in his life: a child, a victim, a student, a doctor and a murderer and a devourer of men. But someone who seeks comfort in another, in their nearness and their soft-spoken words - he wonders if he has ever been that, before now.

Perhaps once, a long time ago.

And now, again.

“I will,” Hannibal tells him. And it’s promise enough for them both.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“We will practice,” Hannibal tells Will, smiling when the boy frowns in genuine displeasure. “And you will. Do it again, Will, watch how I move and where I am, how little I do to get to where we were.”_
> 
> _Will huffs a breath, weighs the knife in his palm again and just looks at it. After a moment, he repeats the motion, knowing it will be deflected, knowing he will be turned, he will be held as before, with no more than a step or two of effort at all._
> 
> _“Again,” Will says, stubbornness tightening his voice._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)! We love you!

The first thing Will learns is that he picks up Thai brilliantly from hearing it and speaking it, but that he cannot write or read it very well. His frustrations start early, when Hannibal dictates words to him from the kitchen and he has to write them in the strange swirling script on the page before him. Will stares forlornly at the mistakes as they are pointed out to him and looks up at Hannibal with wide puppy eyes when he asks if he really must learn to write and read the language as well as speak it.

“I would need to understand, not to write,” Will insists. “We won’t exactly be signing a contract with the men you’re about to kill, and we can always fake not knowing what they want if they make us read something.”

Hannibal levels a look on the boy and Will draws his shoulders up a little, chastened.

“You need to know, so that your ignorance of the language is a game, not a reality,” Hannibal tells him. “You will find yourself in a situation where the language will save your life, I can guarantee it.”

“But I can speak -”

“And you will also read.” Hannibal tells him, turning his page back to him. “And write. We will practice every morning.”

Will’s brows furrow and he watches Hannibal move around the hotel room as though without a care, dressed, again, in his impeccable suits now that his arm has healed up enough that he does not fear it leaving a mess on the sleeves. Will pouts, huffs a sound of displeasure and stretches over the counter, watching him.

“How did you learn?” he asks.

“Practice,” Hannibal answers.

Will’s eyes narrow. “That’s not an answer.”

“It is. I practiced speaking and hearing, reading and writing,” Hannibal says, “Meeting people and radio broadcasts, film and music, touring the country and ensuring that any word that was unfamiliar to me was made familiar.”

As he passes by Will, the boy turns on his stool to watch Hannibal move to tidy the suite in which they live. “So I could watch a film instead.”

“Perhaps, when you are done with your lesson. Think, a moment,” he responds, brow lifted. “We are separated. You are escorting one of the little ones to a safe place. How do you find it?”

“I'll know the city by then,” Will insists.

“You will know it,” Hannibal agrees, “because you will be able to read every sign, you will know the streets by name in sight as well as sound. And to read, one must learn to write. Again, Will. On a fresh sheet, not copied from before.”

Will groans, turning and pressing his face between folded arms. He doesn’t want to learn Thai. He doesn’t want to read and write the strange language. He wants to help people, like Hannibal does. And Will is fairly sure that heroes did not spend so long studying before going out and saving lives.

But despite his fussiness, he reaches for another page, clean, and turns the other over and slides it away so as not to tempt himself to cheat. He sighs, and when Hannibal begins to list words again, Will starts to write them.

His hand is unpracticed, writing sloppy in Thai and English both, and on his own - without prompting or bring this to Hannibal's attention at all - Will has started practicing his letters. He keeps every note Hannibal leaves him, curls his letters the same way, tries to join them. Over and over he works, throwing the paper away before Hannibal can see it.

The more he tries, the more frustrated Will becomes.

It should not be this hard, he is thirteen years old. He mumbles his displeasure and resettles on the seat as Hannibal tells him another word, called from the bedroom.

The page is nearly full by the time Hannibal returns from making the bed and tidying the room, and with a hand against the small of Will’s back, he heralds his silent approach. He leans over the boy’s shoulder.

“Read them to me, please.”

Will nearly crumples the paper right there, wrinkling it beneath tense fingers. Each word is clipped in annoyance, barely restrained. “You just told them to me. You know what they say already. What they’re supposed to say.”

“Repetition is the key to memory,” Hannibal murmurs. “It is how we form connections, whether words on a page or the movements of a blade. Practice.”

With gritted teeth, Will reads back each word, and Hannibal listens. The boy does not see his progress, but Hannibal does - his letters are becoming smoother, recalling the years ago that he learned to write them, his pronunciation clearer. Will stops before the last and smears his hand across it, and Hannibal lifts a brow.

“May I see?”

“No.”

A faint smile appears, and with a movement too quick to be real, Hannibal slips the page from beneath Will’s hand. He reads the scribbled word - surprised to see it there, in Thai, no less - and regards Will from over the page. “That isn’t very nice.”

Will sets his face to one of immense gravitas, though in his eyes there is a schoolboy amusement.

“But it is correctly written,” Hannibal decides, returning Will’s paper to him. “Very good.”

Will bites his lip, cheeks pink, and watches Hannibal from beneath his hair before bringing a hand up to push his glasses up his nose.

"What are we doing today?" he asks, hoping for an answer that will satisfy him. Going out. Watching Hannibal explain where a knife is to go to cause the most bodily harm. Watching Hannibal take the knives in the kitchen and explain which is the most appropriate for a kill and which to torture.

He expects, however, that he is not so lucky.

“When the day begins to cool, we will go out,” Hannibal tells him. “To Wat Arun, and back again. The breeze from the river will help. Five kilometers, each direction, to run when possible, and walk briskly if not.”

Will doesn’t hold back the long groan that pushes itself from his throat, splaying himself over the counter and crinkling his papers beneath him. Hannibal watches this, and strokes a thumb against Will’s knobby spine.

“You will be grateful for it, should you need to flee - moreso when you are able to read the signage around you to navigate,” Hannibal adds, not without a hint of amusement. “Whether you consider it training, or punishment for your added vocabulary will surely affect how enjoyable the experience. I recommend the former.”

“But you said I did it right,” Will mutters into his arms. Hannibal sinks his fingers into Will’s hair, tugging gently, and steps away with no small amount of pleasure.

“So you have,” Hannibal agrees, making his way towards the living room. “And so until the sun begins to set, bring the blade from my coat pocket.” He begins to work aside the couch, the chairs, the table, creating a space for them on the carpet in the center of the room.

At this, at last, Will brightens, happy to forget his punishment - and it is that, truly, little else - for the time it will take them to work with the knife. Perhaps if he does well enough he can convince Hannibal not to make him do it. Or half, perhaps, even that will be easier.

He goes to the bedroom to retrieve the knife and walks back slowly, weighing it in his hand and turning it, wanting to be as fluid with it as Hannibal is, as graceful and strong.

He moves on quiet feet to the space Hannibal has cleared and turns it handle first to pass to him.

"Do you have to use it often?" Will asks. "I thought you paralyzed them first..."

“In most cases, yes,” Hannibal answers, removing his jacket, his tie, turning his wrists in slow circles to limber them. “But the spaces in which we work are often small, narrow. There may be others, unexpected. They themselves may be armed. I use it rarely, and I am grateful for that, but it is better to be ready then caught unawares.”

Only when he is in his shirtsleeves, and even they folded to his elbows, does Hannibal accept the knife from Will. They have not worked on this together often, though Will’s inclination towards it is obvious, outweighing any such interest in activities as equally important, but whose ties are less overt. He will learn them anyway, Hannibal knows, and in time, appreciate them.

Elegant fingers slip the knife open and Hannibal settles it against his palm. “Tell me,” he begins, “the best defense against a knife. The very first thing you should attempt, if an opponent is armed with one.”

“Take it from him,” Will whispers, rising to the balls of his feet.

“Regardless of skill, you are likely to be cut in doing so,” Hannibal corrects, baring his arm - the scar still pink across it - with a mild humor.

Will lifts his eyes from the cut to the blade to the man, and chews his lip. “Knock it out of his hand.”

“The same problem, and worse still, for lacking the control that comes in a lucky disarm. Someone defending themselves with a knife is unlikely to follow any sort of rhythm or pattern, they will move in unanticipated ways, wildly.”

Puffing a sigh, Will’s hair fluffs into his eyes and he frowns. “I don’t know, then.”

“Run,” Hannibal tells him, smiling warmly. “If you have an escape, then removing yourself from the potential to be cut is more important.” He turns the knife towards Will, handle first. “Show me, then, how to hold it and the six angles of attack.”

Will does, allowing the weight of the little blade to settle in his palm, and stepping towards Hannibal on each movement, marks the air from shoulder to hip, across the thighs, center to the throat and a broad sweep across the waist. He exhales, and grins, as Hannibal inclines his head.

“An attack is likely to fall across one of those lines, on statistical chance alone. It is the most natural movements for the human body to follow, and makes susceptible neck and groin and stomach. The sixth angle is preferred, in my experience, by those seeking quick escape - the belly appears tender and exposed. That is not wrong, but knowing this, we may learn to avoid, whether the attack is a stab, or a slash. Come towards me, angle six.”

Will blinks, lips parting as his heart lodges itself somewhere at the hollow of his throat. He forces it down with a swallow, creases his brow, and brings his arm wide across Hannibal’s middle. Almost delicately, Hannibal scoops Will’s hand aside with his own, cupped, in the motion that the boy is taking. Little effort, no strength, and Will finds himself angled at his side to Hannibal. With a single step, Hannibal stands beside the boy, surprised to find himself turned, and sets his hand against Will’s jaw.

“Do not stop their motion,” Hannibal murmurs. “Let them lead it through, and their own weight carries them.”

Will swallows, eyes searching Hannibal’s, and turns his head gently against the hand that holds him.

“I can’t do that,” he says, soft, and Hannibal lets him go.

“You will.”

“Not like you. I didn’t even see how you moved.”

“We will practice,” Hannibal tells Will, smiling when the boy frowns in genuine displeasure. “And you will. Do it again, Will, watch how I move and where I am, how little I do to get to where we were.”

Will huffs a breath, weighs the knife in his palm again and just looks at it. After a moment, he repeats the motion, knowing it will be deflected, knowing he will be turned, he will be held as before, with no more than a step or two of effort at all.

“Again,” Will says, stubbornness tightening his voice.

And so they do, over and over, until finally Hannibal stands, still, holding the boy only loosely against his chest. A thumb skims Will’s jaw, no more than that, as Hannibal says, “Conserve your energy. Let them use theirs. Do not resist the flow of their movement, but follow when they commit to a motion and then react.”

He releases Will but finds the boy still pressed back against him, knife gripped tight, frustration holding his jaw taut now when Hannibal’s hand falls from it. Instead, then, he presses them to Will’s shoulders, up and down his arms.

“It takes time,” he says softly. “You have that now to spend. Let it be spent.”

Grasping Will’s wrist only in passing, Hannibal works the knife from his fingers and steps back. He bends his knees to lower his center of gravity, and waits until Will finally turns and their eyes meet.

“Try, Will. That is all I ask.”

“I did,” the boy replies, clipped, and looks away again, cheeks pink from the effort and displeasure of this exercise. He wonders if there is anything he can learn that he can show progress in, that he can show he actually _can_. He cannot run for more than a handful of moments, he cannot attack without being twisted for his effort. He cannot write Thai, or read it.

“I have,” he adds, harsh, and chews his lip. “It’s not working.”

“Time, Will,” Hannibal reminds him and the boy snorts his displeasure, like a pony, turning his toe against the ground. “No skill comes overnight. They take effort until one can perform them and appear to require none.”

The boy determinedly glares out the window, avoids Hannibal near-masterfully when he tries to catch his eye again. He purses his lips and relaxes them, over and over, eyes too-bright behind his glasses.

With a pensive sound, Hannibal straightens again. He closes the knife, and slips it to his pocket, allowing Will his space, his anger and his annoyance. Hannibal does not take it personally - there is no reason to - but it does little to ease the residual, oil-slick gleam of guilt that shines across his thoughts.

“There is a moment, when one is learning, when the newness and excitement of the endeavor wears thin. It is no longer a novelty, no longer a thrill. It begins to feel tedious, when the initial progress of the novice, quickly made, begins to feel as though it has stopped entirely.”

Hannibal ducks his head, and with a breath begins to unfold his sleeves.

“This is when true progress begins, and when it is hardest to feel. Whether you believe me or not, you are a remarkable boy, bright and clever, and very brave. We will rest, today, if you like,” Hannibal allows. “But you must trust my honesty, Will, and that even if you are unable to see how you’ve grown, that I can see it clearly.”

Will swallows and sniffs, angry at his own weakness, here, where he should be pushing himself to progress. He holds a moment more before turning to Hannibal and shaking his head.

“I want to keep trying,” he says, jaw still set, anger still clear but with a different tint, now; where the other had felt pitying and resigned, this anger is internally aimed, a push to do more, and try more, and _succeed_ is even a little, if only today. “I want to know how you move, so I can try.”

He tries. Despite the frailty in his body, the strain of effort poured into learning languages and finding new muscle and running, the hated running. Despite frustration to the point of tears, despite the bright, red-cheeked grins when Hannibal praises him. Despite it all, Will tries.

And in time, as Hannibal promised, he becomes better.

Hannibal watches the boy unfurl like a peony. Petal by petal, each arranged in perfect order, Will begins to bloom and it is all Hannibal can do at times to restrain from snaring him around the waist to squeeze in admiration and wonder both. He recalls his own lessons, furious and bitter, he recalls his own growth through them, and he cannot fault the boy for being a teenager, swinging from moodiness to effervescence from one moment to the next.

He is as glad Will has that experience as he is all the others.

“Faster,” Hannibal tells him, waiting for Will to set himself at a slight angle, balanced agile on the balls of his feet. He steps forward, bringing the knife across, to find it swept aside, back again, as Will circles to keep Hannibal’s back and the blade at bay. They repeat, over and over, faster, until Hannibal swipes from another angle - not the same as all the times before - and Will ducks beneath and catches the man’s wrist and elbow.

With a shove of Hannibal’s arm - held locked - up into his shoulder, he brings the man to a knee, and in defeat, yielded with a wide smile, Hannibal drops the blade, and murmurs.

“Very good, Will.”

Will snarls, just a soft noise, and then gently lets Hannibal go, slipping his hand free of Hannibal’s so as not to hurt him, even by accident, and kneels beside him.

“I could have been faster.”

“You could have,” Hannibal agrees, not unkindly, and draws a hand through Will’s hair, watching the boy close his eyes and lean into him. “You will be. But this is very, very good, Will.”

The boy doesn’t argue today, allows the praise, and watches Hannibal as he sits, before folding his legs beneath himself and leaning back on his arms. He smiles, ducks his head, and makes a little noise, like a laugh.

“Can we not run this evening?” he asks, knowing the answer anyway, knowing they will, and that he will manage farther today than he did the day before, than he did the day before that. He is getting better, faster, stronger. He can feel his muscles pull not with pain but with the need to stretch them further, now. He spreads in bed at night and sleeps without waking. Rarely, now, the nightmares come, but when they do, Will finds himself freed from their horrors more quickly.

“Can we do something fun?” Will offers instead, lip between his teeth.

Hannibal closes the blade and sets it aside, leaning back to sit as Will does, upon the floor. A smile appears and he allows it, all the fondness that fills him when he works with the boy drawing fine lines from the corners of his eyes. “Is this not?”

“This is serious,” Will says, but a snorted laugh breaks the somber expression he tries to hold.

“It is,” agrees Hannibal. “What do you suggest then, instead?”

Will’s brows lift, and he bites his lip in a grin, delighted. “Anything.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“What do you do for fun?” Will asks, and Hannibal watches as Will uncurls his legs, and stretching, extends them out in front of him.

“Things that you would not consider to be,” he muses. “Museums and restaurants. Music and dance.”

A little scoot across the carpet brings Will close enough to set his feet in Hannibal’s lap, and after a moment, Hannibal sets his hands to one to rub his thumbs against, working out the muscles. “We could watch a film,” Hannibal offers. “Though the noise is considerable, there is an arcade, not far.”

Will squirms a little at the tickling touch but does not draw his feet back. “I like museums,” Will counters, “and it would be nice to go out to dinner, for a change.” He grins when Hannibal looks up at him, eyes barely narrowed as though to ask if his meals are not up to par. Will hums, a pleased, low noise and shakes his head. “I like going anywhere with you.”

It’s true. They walk in the city, sometimes after dark, though Hannibal is rarely happy to take Will out, then, unless they are running together. They practice Thai together in the mornings, Hannibal makes Will read all the signs and asks him directions from places they had been, to places he only knows about from maps. Will enjoys the company. He enjoys knowing Hannibal will always be there.

“Perhaps I could teach you a thing or two at the arcade,” he points out. “A master there where you are here. Perhaps we should go. A lesson in humility.” Will bites his lip, brows up in a semblance of utter innocence, holding the laughter back just long enough before it bursts forth, bright and genuine and delighted.

“I should not have mentioned it,” Hannibal sighs, feigning dismay. It could not be further from the truth. Another petal spreading beautiful, opening to seek the sun after blooming first into darkness. “How will you heed me then, knowing my weakness?”

Another laugh, bubbly and entirely too charming. He lays back on the carpet, turning to his side to watch Hannibal from under a spill of dark hair as the man tilts his head to match the angle. “Even superheroes have a weakness,” Will finally says.

“Then I will rely on you, should an altercation come to quarters.”

“Good,” Will sighs, and it’s too soft, too warm, and he suddenly doesn’t want to move at all, doesn’t want to go anywhere, doesn’t want to do anything but shift a little closer and rest against Hannibal as he does every night. He wants to do more. He wants to touch more. He wants to -

Will’s cheeks warm and he smiles wider.

“The arcade and then dinner?” Will asks softly. “Then home.”

The word settles between them, accepted by both, now. It has been months since Hannibal last tried to convince Will to seek a more stable life than this. Months since he has tried to work out how to sever the increasing closeness between them. Months since he has thought of the embassy.

They have both been uprooted from the homes they once knew. It would be unbearable - savage - to both to break this one apart, too.

“You know that I’ll make you read the signs to me,” Hannibal warns, his voice warm as he gently lifts Will’s feet from his lap, and moves to stand.

“I know,” grins Will, tucking his face against his arm to hide his blush. He takes the hand that Hannibal offers him, uncoiling to his feet with a swift tug, and into Hannibal instead.

The man hesitates, a moment only, before letting his arms settle around Will’s shoulders. They stand for a breath in the embrace, and it is only when Hannibal feels Will open his hands against his back that Hannibal softly steps away.

“Dress,” he says. “And we will go.”

Will nods, ducks his head before moving away to the room to change, pulling his shirt over his head as he goes, knowing that despite himself, Hannibal will turn, and he will look. Will has found, more and more, that he wants him to. That he wants to be seen by Hannibal this way, that he wants to show himself that way.

He dresses in something entirely unfit for an arcade, a button down shirt and his nice jeans beneath, soft black shoes. He runs a hand wet with cool water through his hair but doesn’t bother to comb it. When he returns to the main room, he is beaming, bouncing on the balls of his feet at the thought that they could go somewhere, together, and then to dinner together.

Will leans his shoulder against Hannibal when he gets close, eyes up and smile warm when he looks at him.

“Where will we have dinner?”

Hannibal lifts his elbow to allow Will the room, the closeness that he seeks - both seek, in truth. He finishes the elaborate knot on his tie and settles it against his throat, as inappropriately dressed as Will for the occasion, and no less pleased for it.

“I imagine that you have had enough Thai cuisine to last a lifetime,” Hannibal considers. Buttoning his waistcoat, with elbow still tilted upward, he rifles through the options available to them, with little mind for price or formality, the former of which can certainly assuage any lack of the latter. “Italian?”

Wide eyes blink up at him. “Really?”

“Really,” agrees Hannibal.

A pause, before Will grins, mischievous. “Pizza?”

“Not that kind of Italian, I’m afraid,” Hannibal tells him, watching the youth at his side. “Pasta, though, if you wish. And their dessert menu is excellent.”

It takes little more than that to send Will out the door, Hannibal still shouldering into his coat he follows. Down the elevator, out, the knife still in the hotel and Hannibal is glad, for tonight, to leave its weight behind.

They hear the arcade before they see it. Coins clattering from gambling machines, an endless symphony of electronic beeps and melodies, voices a cacophony from those within. Hannibal draws a breath, and finds his willingness bolstered only by Will’s energy beside, near to bursting.

“Stay with me,” Hannibal tells him, before they go in, a caution but tempered as he adds, “I will need you to teach me, after all.”

Will grins and reaches to take Hannibal’s hand to tug him along. His heart beats too quickly, cheeks too warm, but Will doesn’t care. He is here with Hannibal, holding his hand and leading him to an old pinball machine to play silly games for change, because they can. Together.

“This,” Will announces, setting his hand on the game as though to claim it. He doesn’t let go of Hannibal with his other, still holding him palm to palm, hot in the grip between them. “We’ll play on this.”

He turns to Hannibal and raises his eyebrows, tilting his head in a way that the frames of his glasses rest just beneath his eye level, seeing Hannibal as a school teacher might his student, amused grin tugging his lips.

“This develops hand-eye coordination and speed. A worthy game to begin with, I think.”

Hannibal defers to his boyish wisdom and youthful charm, and inclines his head. "Well-stated," he murmurs, seeking a small fold of baht from his pocket, set aside from the rest. "If memory serves, these need be exchanged."

Will takes them and fans them between his fingers, watching Hannibal with no small amount of skepticism.

"There is a counter, I see, just beyond our row to exchange them," Hannibal says. Will squints a little, and Hannibal adds, "I will watch."

He does, almost unblinking, as Will works through the little crowds assembled. He is not bothered, nor a bother himself, unnoticed but by the man at the counter who watches Will in surprise when the boy asks for coins in Thai.

He's grinning as he returns, and tries to hide it shyly but it does no more good than Hannibal's own attempts to mute his smile. Accepting the coins to his palm, he slips the first to the machine.

"Show me."

Will steps up to the machine, fingers on the buttons, before he turns to look at Hannibal over his shoulder. “Stand closer, so you can see.”

To Will’s great pleasure, the man steps up behind him, close enough that Will can feel the heat of him against his back and he closes his eyes in pleasure. He wants to lean back, wants to rest his head on Hannibal’s shoulder, though he is far too short to even reach. Instead, he releases the ball and watches it light up the ladder leading it into the game.

“The objective is simple,” Will tells him, not turning beyond the slightest tilt of his chin for Hannibal to hear over the bright metallic music and the loud chatter around them. “You keep the ball from falling through between the flippers.” He presses the buttons to demonstrate how to work them, one expertly catching the ball to flick it up into the body of the game once more.

Will wriggles his hips a little, adjusts his position, and turns quickly, just once, to grin at Hannibal, before the game truly begins. Will is quick, good with timing and careful with balancing the ball just where he needs it before flicking it back. The points add up and a cheery mechanical voice chirps in Thai about how well he’s doing.

Hannibal watches less the game - easy enough to follow, though he is entirely prepared to fail at it himself - than he does Will. He stands behind him, where the boy settles back just a little, and leans a little himself, in response. Just enough to set his chin atop Will’s head and watch comfortably. Just that. No more.

He has refused to allow the passing hints of thought that Will inspires in him any purchase. Will increasingly bares himself, shirtless, in Hannibal’s presence. He watches to see the man watching. He touches frequently, and lets his hands linger where Hannibal allows them.

There is no room for the pale curiosity about Will’s pervasive bloom, the distant interest in why he would display himself so.

It does not matter.

It cannot matter.

It is everything that Hannibal has fought against. It is everything he swore to Will and swears to himself again, now, that he does not want.

It still steals a breath from him, out of time and sudden, when Will pushes back against his chest, and losing a ball down the chute, reaches back to grasp Hannibal’s wrists.

“You try,” he says, and Hannibal is grateful for the noise that covers the working of his throat.

He sets his hands to the flippers, and Will glides his fingers across them to help.

The cheerful music begins again and the ball is off, Will stepping closer to the game so Hannibal can as well, allowing him to play unhindered and unhelped. The first ball falls through quickly, and Will pushes another coin in to start them another game, watching Hannibal steel himself before playing.

It is lovely to watch, the man so beautifully dressed standing in a loud arcade that he does not at all fit into, playing pinball because Will had wanted to. Will wants to turn around and press to his chest, to hold him close, to nuzzle. But he knows it would not be looked on kindly here, Hannibal would not be looked kindly on for it. This part of town is not the one in which Will had been held captive - here, people would notice.

Will laughs, clasping his hands together when Hannibal beats his score, a calm concentration on his beautiful features as he continues to play. Will just watches, delighted.

“I should not have gone easy on you,” Will comments, grinning when this game is finally lost and a new ball drops in to be played. “I’ve made you believe this is yet another thing you are better at than me.”

Humming, Hannibal allows a small smile. “I have only done so well because of your guidance,” he murmurs. “Without it, they would all be lost.”

He withdraws his hands to let Will play again, fingers skimming skinny wrists. Just that.

Just that.

Just this, that, and another.

He steps away, to put space between them both and space between his thoughts and actions, and stands instead at the side of the machine, to watch Will play again.

“I am waiting for the day that your talents cease to amaze me,” he admits.

Will turns to him and his smile is just beneath his eyes, fluid and soft and genuine. He bites his lip before setting the last ball to go, to finish up the game, and playing in earnest, now, laughing when Hannibal tries to gently distract him when their scores begin to even, shaking his head and still playing.

He manages to beat the score by just a handful of points and turns to Hannibal, leaning against the game to watch him, narrow-eyed in his pleasure. He bites his lip, a slow and deliberate motion, before releasing it and stepping closer to Hannibal, keeping his voice low so the man has to duck his head to hear.

“I should start bringing you here to train, like you take me for runs in the evening,” Will comments, pleased by the notion of pulling Hannibal in here often enough that they have genuine contests on the rickety machine.

“You view that as a punishment,” Hannibal reminds him, eyes wrinkling with a smile that only appears there.

“And you wince every time the machine makes a loud noise,” Will points out, raising his chin to speak a little closer to Hannibal’s ear.

“A fair trade, then,” sighs the man. “Perhaps we will start with once, weekly, and if I am not deafened by that, progress.”

“Fair trade,” agrees Will, and Hannibal leans away before Will’s cheek brushes his own.

They play for a little while more - rather, Will plays, several machines, pinball and video games, though Hannibal steers him away from the gambling machines. Hannibal is truthfully entirely pleased to watch, to listen to the delight that takes his boy as Will explains and complains in turn.

He is wonderful.

And after a second fold of baht is fed in coins to the machines, they emerge into the night air, still smothering but tolerable with the sun set. It is pleasant enough that at the restaurant, Hannibal asks to be seated outside in the garden, and when the waiter refers to Will as his son, Hannibal’s expression flickers once tighter, and then smooths again. He does not correct him.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Will makes a sound, not the weak little noises of before, but something softer, and ducks his head against the soft fingers that touch him. The dream had been so real, a mix and mash of so many situations, so many terrifying nights, that Will got tangled, he couldn’t get out. He realizes, through the blur of it all, that he had called for Hannibal. He had called his name, not just a scream into the dark like before._
> 
> _He had called and Hannibal had come._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

Will can’t breathe.

He can’t breathe because there is a hand against his mouth, pushing hard enough to force his head to the bed, to bend his neck enough to hurt. The hand smells unclean, like sweat and something filthy. Will doesn’t want it near him, he doesn’t want it on him at all.

He twists. He bucks, shaking his head, eyes closed and lips pressed hard together so he doesn’t have to taste the palm against him, so he doesn’t have to feel it closer than it is already.

Will makes a sound, little, and struggles harder, but he can’t move his hands, he can’t move his legs - though they can be moved for him, and they are. Spread wide and pushed so his knees draw up and bend. He is naked. Restrained with the oily rope that was always near the bed, he knows he will have burns on his wrists from the struggle. He knows, and he still struggles, still thrashes and twists.

And then the hand is gone and he can draw a breath, fill his burning lungs and scream -

“Hannibal!” It doesn’t sound like himself, it sounds younger, weak, not something the man would hear, not something anyone would hear. The hand returns in a rough shove and folds over Will’s mouth again. But this time he bites, he rends and twists and struggles and sobs Hannibal’s name again.

“Good boy.”

The words wrack Will’s body taut. Slight muscles pull so tight he can’t fight, he can’t do anything more than shake, and try to breathe past the musky sweaty smell, and the fingers that make it hard to take in air. He can’t do anything more than cry, hurt and afraid and confused.

“Beautiful boy, breathe for me.”

But he can’t and the pain pushes his voice from him even more, fills him with such sharp, stabbing agony that there’s no room for his lungs or air to fill them. He chokes, sputtering, he swallows down the bile in his throat because he knows how bad the beatings are when he’s sick, how he’ll be made to sleep in it, bloody and filthy.

“Listen to me.”

He blinks, but the world is a blur, wet and wavering.

“Will, listen to my voice.”

There is a body pressed hot against his own and the hand is gone and he thrashes, throwing skinny limbs every which way, hurling his body to try and break free, shouting not words but animal sounds, so far from his own voice that he doesn’t recognize them.

And still Hannibal holds him, gouged by sharp elbows and torn by fingernails, kicked and battered. He keeps his arms firm around Will not because it helps, but to stop him from hurting himself in his terror.

“Breathe, Will,” Hannibal murmurs against his ear, spreading a hand through Will’s hair to remove even that barrier from his face. “Breathe, beautiful boy.”

The gasps Will draws pull no more than wisps of air against him and he panics, turning one way or another to try and get more air but finding that he can’t, that his lungs don’t work, and his vision is going dark, bright specks of bright fireflies every time he blinks, and Will closes his eyes altogether, manages a sob.

And that seems enough to route the rusty mechanism in his mind again to breathe, to pull in air and push it out again, over and over. Shuddered and weak, but breathing so the pops of color and light go away and he can see again. He shakes so hard his entire body has tensed, as though electrocuted, as though preparing to be hurt merely for waking up.

The arms start to ease from around him and Will makes another of those pitiful wailing sounds, pressing back instead.

“Don’t let go.” The words are mangled, by spit and sobs and shallow breaths, until the bastardized French sounds almost unintelligible. “Don’t let me go, please don’t, I’ll be good, I’ll be quiet, I’ll be good, just don’t let go, he gets so angry when I come back early please -”

Hannibal blinks, his own sudden awakening making the connections take a moment longer than they normally might. A gentle hushing sound whispers over Will’s hair as Hannibal nuzzles against him, arms tightening once more to hold his boy tight against his chest. He thumbs away the tears from his cheeks, the mucous from beneath his nose. Framing Will's face with tenderness, Hannibal presses his palm there, too.

“I won’t let go,” Hannibal murmurs in French, his voice rolling low and warm across the words. “Will, brave Will. No one will be angry with you again. No one will hurt you. Sweet Will.”

Will grasps for him, fingers clutching numb to Hannibal’s shirt, his shoulder, pulling himself shaking to bury his head against Hannibal’s chest, and wailing a long agony when Hannibal rubs firm and steady, up and down his back.

“Listen to my voice,” says Hannibal. “You are safe. You are safe with me and I won’t let you go.”

Will forces himself to believe the words, carried on that same warm tone and same smooth voice he has grown to associate with comfort and joy. He listens, he presses close and lets the slow motion of Hannibal’s hands over his back calm him to a semblance of himself again. He doesn’t let go for a long time, smearing sticky tears against Hannibal’s chest, listening to his heart, slow and steady, and trying to match his own to it.

When he pulls back, he’s still trembling, fingers clumsy when he goes to wipe his eyes, and he doesn’t lift them to see Hannibal, humiliated by the response to a dream - just a frightening dream.

At least, Will considers, he didn’t wet the bed this time.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, resting heavy against the pillow, working the tension from his muscles with breathing and willpower alone.

“Do not be,” Hannibal tells him, still speaking dulcet French, watching to see that Will hears. A curious thing, a strange patois in the language when he spoke it. From a place that was warm, near the water, where the trees never changed. American.

Louisiana, Hannibal knows, but it doesn’t matter right now. Perhaps it doesn’t matter at all.

Hannibal does not stop touching him. Mouth resting against Will’s brow, he breathes for the boy who struggles to fill his own lungs. Hand flat against his back, he rubs the tension away when Will cannot readily ease it himself. He closes his eyes, and speaks softly.

“There was a forest, very large, near the castle. Once my family used it for hunting, long before I was born. We were not allowed to go there - they said that wild things lived in it, wolves and rutting stags, boars with tusks as big as one’s forearm, and bears too. Many frightening things,” he murmurs. “Of course I went anyway.”

A little shudder is the nearest Will manages to a laugh.

“I would wander a bit further from the grounds, a bit nearer each time, until one day I finally reached the forest’s edge. It was nearly black inside, like day turned to night, with trees so tall overhead that I couldn’t see where they ended. I told myself to be unafraid - to be brave in venturing there - but as the darkness overcame me, I found that I was shaking. I wanted to run back home, to safety, but equally curious I wandered deeper.”

Will’s breath hitches, quieting.

“I thought that I had gone very far inside, and could only imagine the great beasts that were certainly on my heels, hunting me down. Something caught my leg, enough to tear my fabric and cut my skin, enough to make me bleed. A boar, I was certain, or worse - a monster as old as the woods themselves. I tripped, in my hurry out, my ankle snared by it. Picking myself up, filthy now from falling, I ran as fast as I could and only when I emerged again into the sun realized I had hardly breached the forest at all.”

Fingers curling against Hannibal’s chest, Will finally lifts his head. “What was it?”

“A branch, broken. A root, around my foot,” Hannibal admits, smiling gently. “We are always afraid of what we cannot see, and I was terrified. You,” he says, cradling a finger under Will’s chin. “You have faced real monsters, brave Will, and survived them still.”

Will makes a sound, not the helpless noises of before, but something softer, and ducks his head against the soft fingers that touch him. The dream had been so real, a mix and mash of so many situations, so many terrifying nights, that Will got tangled, he couldn’t get out. He realizes, through the blur of it all, that he had called for Hannibal. He had called his name, not just a scream into the dark like before.

He had called and Hannibal had come.

Will sniffs, brings his hand up to wipe under his nose too, and finally looks up, face red from crying, wet, still. Eyes too-bright and barely open.

“You speak French,” Will says, his own nothing on Hannibal’s practiced and coiling control of the language.

Hannibal’s fingers brush Will’s own in wiping his ruddy cheeks dry, skimming gently over skin made clammy in fear. He smiles, again, just a little.

“You’ve stolen my thoughts exactly,” he remarks, with mild amusement. “I studied in Paris, for a time. It is more notable by far that you speak French. I did not know.”

Will shakes his head, unable to voice the confusion that creases his brow, and Hannibal smooths the furrow with his thumb.

“Memory is a strange thing,” Hannibal says. “Important moments can seem lost, only to be found again when they are least expected. Language embeds itself very deeply, like the memory of movement when we train together. A part of you, rather than an active thought. I am glad it has remained. I am glad it has found its way to the surface again.”

And yet - cruelly, Hannibal knows - there is a fear in him, too. If Will remembers this, he may remember more. What then, if he recalls his entire name? What then, if he recalls his home with more clarity? And if those thoughts turn to nostalgia, nostalgia to longing…

He would let him go. He would help him get there. And he would miss him, an ache deep in his bones like the memory of a fracture, a pain that would not fade.

Hannibal does not stop himself from touching a kiss to Will’s brow.

Will shivers at the touch but instead of the tension that had throbbed through him before, Will relaxes, almost entirely, from the kiss. He bites his lip and lets his eyes close and rests that way a moment, Hannibal close and himself still twitching with erratic shivers as the adrenaline passes through his system.

Will curls a hand in Hannibal’s shirt and just holds, childish and small.

He doesn’t want to think about where the French came from, he doesn’t remember. It is a blank and black space in his mind, from which, once in a while, something escapes and invades Will entirely. Flashes of a house he doesn’t know, conversations he can’t remember having, now this. He feels like a broken television transmitting multiple programs at once, flicking channels and landing mostly in white noise.

“Can we sleep in today?” Will asks him softly. He doesn’t want to move, he doesn’t want to get up and practice his Thai, or practice with the knife, or go running. He feels, suddenly, so tired. So incredibly tired.

“Yes,” Hannibal answers, without hesitation. “You have already fought very hard today. I think a rest has been well-earned.”

His lips brush Will’s forehead as he speaks, when he doesn’t draw away and Will draws closer. Arms around his boy, he holds him to warm the cold from his skin, the pain from his body, the unwanted thoughts that preyed upon him. Both lie awake, eyes open, both unwilling to yield themselves or each other back to darkness.

“I’m glad you called for me,” Hannibal tells him softly.

Will just nuzzles closer, still holds against Hannibal as he had upon his terrified waking. He can’t imagine having called for anyone else, though he knows that when he was first taken he had. He would cry and call for his dad or his mom, he would whimper incoherent words and scream until hands held him silent.

But no one had ever answered then. Not like Hannibal had today, immediate and warm and reassuring, holding Will close even when the boy wanted nothing more than to thrash himself to unconsciousness.

“Thank you for finding me,” Will tells him. Here, and at that filthy house, and every time Will seeks with unsure fingers. He always finds Hannibal and Hannibal always finds him.

Eventually, they doze, Will pressed up against Hannibal’s chest, arms against his own between them for comfort. Will wakes once or twice, just to shift position before he nuzzles up and sleeps again, listening to Hannibal’s heart beat against his own.

He wakes when it’s very warm, the sun pushing eager fingers through the curtains they’ve drawn. Will blinks at it, squints his eyes and opens them properly, watching how that changes how much light enters his eyes and how it morphs as it does. Kaleidoscope patterns through his lashes and bright white when he opens his eyes. Beneath him, Hannibal breathes slowly but he isn’t sleeping, and Will wonders how he knows.

Without thinking much about it, before he loses the nerve, Will presses a kiss under Hannibal’s jaw.

Hannibal’s breath catches, held just a beat out of rhythm, and though this betrays his wakefulness he keeps his eyes closed. He can see clearly enough in his mind’s eye the brave boy bathed in sunlight, beautiful and bold. The sun would light his hair to the warm, rich shine of polished bronze, flood across his cheeks and pink them to color.

If he is asleep, he has done no wrong.

If he does not return the affection, their boundaries remain in tact.

All of which means nothing when after a pensive, long moment, Will leans to kiss Hannibal again. He holds his lips there, over the man’s prickly morning stubble, until Hannibal’s jaw works as if to unsettle the gentle touch. He lifts a hand to Will’s hair, sun-warmed curls twisting through his fingers.

There is no accusation in his voice - if anything, a failing resolve - when Hannibal asks, “What are you doing?”

Will freezes, doubting himself for a moment, doubting that this is wanted, that it will be accepted. But he is not being pushed away, not being told to leave or stop. He breathes softly against the skin he had just kissed, feels the way Hannibal’s fingers flex in his hair, always gentle, always soft. Affectionate.

Maybe more than affectionate.

Maybe Will is hoping so hard for something that isn’t there that he has deluded himself into this.

He swallows.

“Kissing you,” Will says.

At this, Hannibal smiles, knowing that he should not and choosing to allow it anyway. Just that, to not embarrass the boy for his affection. Just that, to perhaps ease his own turmoil about the feelings that are warm and invasive as summer ivy between his ribs.

He wonders at how far he’s come with _just that_ , without realizing it, until now. He wonders how much further _just that_ will let his conviction slip.

It is telling that when Will kisses him again, Hannibal only curls his fingers in his boy’s hair and sighs, soft, at the tender press of lips drifting across his cheek. “Why?” Hannibal manages, stroking his thumb across Will’s temple, eyes still closed. “Will, I have not asked for this. You do not owe it to me, or anyone.”

Another hesitation, Will’s lips parted and breath shivering before he closes his mouth and swallows. He knows Hannibal has not asked. Hannibal never would. He would never coax Will to be with patronizing words and sickly-sweet promises. He would not touch Will how Will did not want to be touched. He would not force him, all the time whispering to him that it’s okay, that he will enjoy it if he just relaxes.

No.

Hannibal never would. He never has.

“I want to kiss you,” Will tells him, nuzzling gently against Hannibal’s cheek. “It makes you smile. And my stomach just -” Will bites his lip and settles, just pressed close, cheeks on fire with the admission, hoping they cool before Hannibal sees him this way. “I can stop,” he says, turning his words into Hannibal’s shoulder. _But I don’t want to._

It is not often in Hannibal’s life that he has found his words taken from him - rarer still that they’ve been taken not by force and brutality, but by an unfathomable sweetness. Music, on infrequent occasions, has had the effect. A piece of art poignant and perfect.

Perhaps that is what this is. An extraordinary beauty that moves right past reason into sentiment.

He says nothing, he will not coax the boy and tell him it’s fine, that in itself an emotional call-to-action. He will not tell him no, and rebuff the tender, fumbling advances that Hannibal relishes with the same turn of stomach that Will tried haltingly to describe.

It is wrong. Entirely wrong.

He is thirteen.

His cheek is smooth as silk and sun-warmed where Hannibal touches his lips in return.

A laugh shivers out of Will, little and nervous, and he lies against Hannibal still, does not move, until he pushes up on his arms and watches him, cheeks dark and eyes wide and lips parted as he watches Hannibal sleepy beneath him. He wants to kiss him properly, he wants to press into him entirely and let Hannibal have him.

Any way he wants.

 _Because_ he didn’t ask for it, because Will knows if he doesn’t offer, the man never will.

He sucks his lip between his teeth and releases it, bringing a hand down to take Hannibal’s and press his cheek against it. He holds, a moment, more, before sitting up and stretching his arms over his head with a soft groan, shirt riding up to reveal his stomach, taut and flat, still. When Will settles, he’s smiling, cheeks still warm and heart still hammering, still wanting to give himself over.

He will, he’s sure. He will.

He wants to.

“I’m going to make breakfast for you today,” Will informs him, smiling. “Pancakes.”

Hannibal ducks his head, as if to hide his own slight smile at the words. His thumb strokes across Will’s cheek, his fingers dip to settle against his pulse. Just that, just that, just that until he rests it lower, fingertips against the boy’s collar bone and palm pressed flat to his chest.

“I would be honored,” Hannibal tells him, and he wonders where Will learned such a thing, he wonders how out of all the holes and dens and captivities in this city he found this boy, he wonders.

He wonders if Will truly wants what he seems to want, or if it’s only habits as deeply ingrained as his Cajun French.

He wonders if he truly wants what he seems to want, or if it’s just a desperate desire to be so close to someone who understands and accepts him as he is.

Another kiss brushes Will’s cheek, another stroke of his thumb over a broad clavicle.

Just that.

Just this.

Just Will.

The boy blushes, delighted, and slips from the bed to go to the main room to start. He listens to Hannibal move around in the bedroom, just shifting for a moment before he pushes to stand, moves to the bathroom and doesn’t close the door.

Will gets what he needs, milk and flour, two eggs and sugar, a large pan that Hannibal keeps meticulously smooth despite how often he uses it for their dinners, and butter from the fridge. The batter he makes quickly, careful not to spill anything on Hannibal’s counter as he stirs and presses out all the lumps. He wishes they had something else to add to it, like blueberries or chocolate.

He supposes he will stick with fresh fruit around them, when they’re cooked.

It strikes Will, for a moment of slight panic, that he hasn’t made these in years and years. Maybe he’ll burn them, maybe the batter tastes awful - he tastes, sighs in relief when it tastes just fine - maybe -

It doesn’t matter. Will puts some butter in the pan and watches it melt, hissing over the surface until it bubbles, and then takes a small glass from the cupboard to dip into the batter and pour it into the pan.

When Hannibal emerges again, it is to a hotel suite once claimed for comfort and the semblance of the life he has left on sabbatical in Baltimore. A home now, made by the both of them, full of the gentle sounds and rich scents that make it more than merely a place to sleep. He is dressed only in slacks and a shirt, untucked and folded to his elbows - no waistcoat, jacket, or tie to formalize their day off, together.

Bare feet pad across the hardwood floor, the dense carpet, until Hannibal takes his seat where Will normally does instead, to watch him work. He is still in the oversized undershirt borrowed from Hannibal, still in the little briefs beneath. Hannibal looks away from the long, strong legs that shift to and fro as Will wrestles with the pan and the spatula and the pancakes. He tries not to feel the way Will’s words wound wonderfully within when he said simply that he was kissing him.

The sensation of soft lips against his cheek tickles across his scruffy face even still.

“Should I make coffee?” Hannibal offers. “And pour juice for you? I do not want to impose on the chef, hard at work.”

“I can do it,” Will tells him, grinning over his shoulder, pushing up on tiptoes to slide another pancake onto the waiting plate. He spreads some butter over it so it doesn’t stick to the one he’ll put on top and then he sets the pan and pours the last of the batter into it, putting the bowl into the sink to fill with water.

“I’ve seen you work the machine.” Will reaches up to turn the thing on, still on his toes though he doesn’t have to be, and moves to get two mugs from the cupboard. He is quick to flip the pancake before it burns and continues on across the counter to get two more plates, for them, and to open the fridge for the fruit stored there, still cut from the fruit salad the night before. He bounces to the pantry for the jar of jam as well.

It’s like an orchestra, coordinated by a new conductor, still fresh with ideas and excited to see what he can create. Will makes sure the mug is placed where it needs to be and starts the machine, spreads jam on the pancakes before carefully rolling them up to place on the plates, blowing on his fingers when they get burned, and sucking them clean of sticky jam and slick butter.

It’s all a whirlwind, but never messy, and Will brings Hannibal’s plate to the table first, returns with his coffee and cutlery on the next trip, and grins, watching Hannibal take him in.

“First the arcade, and now this,” Hannibal remarks, watching the boy whirlwind to and fro. “You are putting my own skill to shame.”

“You haven’t tried it yet.”

When Will laughs, he snorts, a sound that thrills Hannibal every time he hears it. It is so unlikely a thing, a sound that given circumstance and statistic might never have been heard again. And every time, every single time Will lets it loose, Hannibal is grateful to near-piety that they have survived long enough to inspire and appreciate it.

“You are making me soft,” Hannibal chides him. “I was meant to be a cruel and remorseless tutor, heartless. And now I praise you without even a taste.”

Will grins, and Hannibal can do no more than wait for Will to join him.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Nestled, each reads - Will his story of renegade computer intelligence and totalitarian governments, Hannibal his Proust, yet and always unfinished. His cheek is warm where he rests it to Hannibal’s ribs, his body - slight but growing stronger - a welcome fit against the older man’s side. The tension loosens from Hannibal, muscle by muscle, tendon by tendon, when Will seems content to remain as he is._
> 
> _But he is nothing, if not surprising._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

They share breakfast, they share words. They share languages - English and Thai and now French - and they share the work of washing the few dishes supplied to the suite. Hannibal begins to suggest that they begin a lesson, but an arched brow from his boy stops him, and he yields.

A day off, well-deserved by both. A day of rest to share each other’s company without work or obligation.

Hannibal will still go out, come nightfall. Whether Will knows or accepts it hardly matters. There are proprietors to pursue. Dens to discover. Captives to free and that part of Hannibal’s life is ceaseless, while he is here.

But for now, with the laundry sent out through the front desk, and the kitchen cleaned to an even greater tidiness than the room service itself might achieve, Hannibal takes up a book that he has yet to finish, with so little time, and with a murmur says, “Perhaps later we will watch a film.”

Will nods, happy to agree, and goes to get a book as well, one that Hannibal had bought him. Adventure and warmth and good language. He has been rereading it, on days when he needs to let his mind calm down, on days when he just needs to breathe and pretend he is just a kid again. He knows he will wear the covers dog-eared soon.

He settles on the same couch as Hannibal and pushes his feet beneath the man’s thigh until Hannibal obliges and lifts his leg for Will to settle as he wants.

They ease into comfortable silence, no need to keep talking when they have nothing to say, enough that both are here, calm and quiet and together. Will falls into his book, flipping pages to get to the parts he loves most, wriggling his toes beneath Hannibal’s leg until the man settles a hand against his ankle and keeps him still.

It’s so welcome, this touch, and Will thinks again of how he had snuggled against him that morning, how he had pulled the courage from every point of his being to kiss Hannibal after wanting to for so long.

He thinks of how it had felt to be kissed by him, gentle, almost worshipful.

Will has never been touched like that before.

It is perhaps an hour until Will slips his feet from Hannibal’s hold and settles with them curled beneath him. Then forward onto his knees, then stretched once more to rest his head against Hannibal’s side, book still between his fingers, pages still turned as he pretends to read passages he knows almost by heart now.

Hannibal allows it. He wonders, in truth, if there’s anything he wouldn’t allow, and the litany of thoughts is enough to distress him into dismissing that particular intellectual exploration. Instead, he simply lifts his arm to allow Will as near as he seeks to be, and lowers it over his shoulders again.

Nestled, each reads - Will his story of renegade computer intelligence and totalitarian governments, Hannibal his Proust, yet and always unfinished. His cheek is warm where he rests it to Hannibal’s ribs, his body - slight but growing stronger - a welcome fit against the older man’s side. The tension loosens from Hannibal, muscle by muscle, tendon by tendon, when Will seems content to remain as he is.

But he is nothing, if not surprising.

He moves in inches, little fidgeting adjustments that as separate pieces seem meaningless, but together turn him whole to rest more fully against the man, hold his book against Hannibal’s leg, to lift his chin, to kiss.

Just there, upon the underside of Hannibal’s jaw.

“Will,” Hannibal murmurs, a warning with no bite behind it.

Will’s lips part a little and close again, a chaste, wet little kiss in the same place as he sighs out slow and steady against Hannibal’s skin. Will wants to kiss him. He loves how his entire body trembles and lights electric when he kisses him, even something like this - Will’s lips to stubble and skin. He cannot even imagine how it would if he kissed Hannibal on the lips.

The book closes, set still against Hannibal’s thigh as Will shifts a little more and noses against Hannibal’s jaw. He kisses him again, a little more pressure, now, more insistence, and this time Hannibal hums and moves, just enough for Will to feel.

“Will, please.” Still soft, still just a warning, no sharpness. Will bites his lip, resting against Hannibal with a sigh. The hand around his shoulder gently curls over him and Will smiles, turning his head into Hannibal a bit more. He presses his wrist against Hannibal’s leg, book still between his fingers, and moves to kneel properly on the couch beside him.

“I want to kiss you,” he says.

“You have done so,” Hannibal tells him, not unkindly. “More than once.”

“I want to keep doing it.”

Hannibal lets his eyes close for an extra heartbeat, seeking patience and willpower that does not come as readily as it should. It splinters a little more when again, Will nuzzles to Hannibal’s neck, lets his mouth linger there and closes it to a brush of lips over his pulse. Hannibal shifts his weight a little towards the arm of the couch, to put even an inch more distance between them, but finds that Will presses just as close again.

It is hormones. It is the discovery that one’s body can feel pleasure, instead of only pain. It is their closeness, misinterpreted. It is a delayed pubescence now rioting mad and Dionysian like spring in bloom.

“I am not who you should share your kisses with,” Hannibal manages. He folds his book closed against his fingers. Resting an elbow on the couch’s arm, cheek against his fingers, he both watches Will and makes his throat unavailable. “There are countless others who will find you every bit as charming as I, and better suited -” 

"No," Will tells him, conviction unwavering, eyes still gently hooded as he watches Hannibal. "I don’t want countless others. I have experienced countless others." He bites his lip gently and sits back on his heels, looking at the man who has pressed himself into the corner of the couch as though afraid. Will wonders if it’s of him or of this.

"You have shown me kindness," Will lists, "honesty, gentleness. You have bothered to give me time. You care. And I care about you. And I want to share my kisses with you."

Will sits forward again and laughs a little when he's gently pushed back down. There is a warmth in the rejection, an affection in it that Will knows is a desire to protect, to keep safe and away from cruelties, but Will has never feared Hannibal, not since he brought him here and kept his word.

"You are nothing like them," Will assures him. "You never will be, Hannibal."

Hannibal’s smile is wan, doubtful, no less appreciative for it but certain all the same. “I am not like them,” he agrees. “And I do not wish to be. Nor do I ever wish to act in a way that might be paralleled in your mind.”

Will is just as stubborn, moreso perhaps, chewing his lip as he inches forward again. “Never,” he says, a childish whisper that draws Hannibal’s gaze to him. “And if you won’t -”

“I won’t.”

“- if you won’t be like them, ever -”

“Will.”

A little sigh huffs from the boy, petulant in finding his desires thwarted. Only for a moment though, before his eyes narrow. “Then don’t,” he decides. Hannibal hardly has time to sigh his relief before he finds Will pressed to him once more, and the boy whispers, “And I will instead.”

Hannibal scarcely restrains a sound as Will sinks another kiss to his neck, another, rising higher to his cheek. Hannibal swallows with a taut click in his throat, he closes his eyes and sits unmoving, barely breathing. His entire focus turned to unresponsiveness, the whole of his willpower used to resist Will’s power.

Will nuzzles, he kisses and sighs against him, little body pressing to Hannibal's side, and Hannibal near trembling with trying not to move, not to respond. At length, Will’s fervor eases, and he merely rests against Hannibal, very close, but no longer as determined to pull the man into showing his affection in return.

Will knows the power of fear, he has let it control him for so long it is a miracle he can breathe some days without fear folding cold fingers over his throat. He understands. It will take time, as Hannibal had told him, and Will is contented to wait.

It is several long moments before Hannibal opens his own book again, before he eases from the tension that had gripped him, before he touches a hand to Will’s forehead, gentles it through his hair, and Will smiles.

Time.

Time he can give him.

It becomes something of a game. Will seeking out Hannibal wherever he is, brushes of fingers as they train together, leaning against him as he cooks. Touching little kisses like the flutter of moth wings to Hannibal’s throat and cheek and chin when they lie together in bed or sit near enough on the couch.

Hannibal resists, every time. And every time, Will tells him he needn’t do anything.

And so he does not, channeling his wanting into attention anywhere else - Will’s lessons, more challenging each time, his own nightly stalking of prey. Cold showers to sturdy himself, turning away as Will stretches conspicuously without his shirt on, trying to catch Hannibal looking. Avoidance and denial become Hannibal’s refuge, gentle scolding to stop met only with a wry grin.

Until even avoidance no longer seems sufficient, when in a spring whose blooming is not waylaid by the near-constant downpour of rain, Hannibal realizes his mistake too late after asking, “What would you like to do for your birthday? We might pick a date and call it that.”

Will looks up from the chair, pen poised where he had been taking dictation just moments before. Thai faster, now, more accurate. Mistakes still appearing here and there but far fewer than when they had started. He considers, tapping his pen gently against the page, before setting it down entirely.

In truth, there are few material things he wants, because there are no material things he needs. He is dressed and fed and kept contented with books and anything he asks for. He doesn’t need a phone, no one to call but Hannibal, he doesn’t need gadgets to make his life interesting. He has had enough happen to allow himself months, maybe years, of an entirely calm life.

But still he considers, chews his lip, and grins up at Hannibal when the man watches him from over the counter.

“I’d like a kiss,” Will tells him. “A real kiss.”

“Will.”

The boy’s smile widens into a laugh, snorted into his arms as he ducks his head, shy and bold all at once. “You asked. And you always say that, always just like that - _Will_.”

“Because you are relentless,” Hannibal chides him. “Something else.”

Stubborn, Will shakes his head, peeking at Hannibal from beneath his hair as he lays on folded arms across the counter. “I don’t want anything else.”

“Then I’ll find something you’ll enjoy -”

“No,” Will scolds him. “No, Hannibal, you asked. That’s what I want.”

The rueful humor eases into hesitance, into dismay, into desire that Hannibal swallows down roughly. Only by his own allowances, one after the next, has this been allowed to continue. It is wrong, the litany goes, it is wrong and he is just as foul as all the men he’s come to kill, it is wrong and he is thirteen.

Fourteen.

“Please,” Hannibal finally says. “Will, what you’re asking of me -”

“What I’m asking,” Will argues, “I’m asking because I want this, with you. Not because you made me do it, not because you coerced me. But because -” Will bites his lip and pushes himself up on his arms, before sliding from the stool. He leans over the counter again, hands clasped together, gently fidgeting, just skin against skin.

“Because you make me feel safe, and you make me feel good, and -” Will’s brows furrow for a moment, cheeks pink as he chooses his words, before he just smiles and lifts his eyes to Hannibal. “I’ve never been kissed before, and I want it to be by someone who matters.”

Will watches him, the internal struggle that Hannibal has come to face daily, with the boy pressing so close and wanting so much. But in truth, had Will felt any reluctance, he would have stopped, had he felt any genuine disgust, he would have stopped. He would have stopped and he would have left, trying to make his way on his own.

He would rather face the streets again than think Hannibal was disgusted by him.

Hannibal thinks of Humbert, and tries not to allow his laugh to sound as bitter as it feels. “Is there any number of times I could say ‘no’ that would convince you?”

“You don’t,” Will points out. “You say my name. You move. You never say no. Not once.”

He blinks at the boy, ardent and all-too correct. “And if I did?”

“Would you mean it?”

Hannibal ducks his head, and after a moment of consideration, fingers curled against the counter, he breaks.

“No,” he whispers.

Will’s expression softens, entirely sweet and soft and needing, and he moves around the counter to Hannibal, to rest against his side as he does so often, now. He doesn’t push, here, he doesn’t do anything but set his hand against Hannibal’s arm and gently hold him. He can feel the tremors that run through the man, the hesitation, the horror at himself for what he wants, for his admission of it.

Will nuzzles against him and sighs.

“You are not like them, Hannibal,” Will repeats. “You are not like them, you save people. You save lives, and you saved mine.”

Will presses a little closer, just to lean his weight against Hannibal properly. “I want you to kiss me, and you want to kiss me. That’s what people do when they love someone.”

Hannibal’s jaw flickers tense, his shoulders pulled taut. Every fiber that has stretched thin in resistance snaps, and he unravels.

But he will not bend upon this boy, he will not overpower him and loom taller, stronger, when he has just been proven that he is anything but. Firm hands catch Will by the waist to lift him, seating him on the counter, just slightly taller than the man who watches every soft curve and warm blush of his boy there before him. He lifts his hands, reverent, nearly trembling, to place to Will’s cheeks, and though part of him cries out to plead with Will not to use that word with him, to remind him of all of his cruelties, as bad as any other - to tell him that in this, he is no better than the worst of them -

His eyes soften, lips just slightly parted, and Hannibal sighs.

Will sits where he’s placed, trembling as much as Hannibal is, nervous in the most beautiful way about this, now that he has asked for it and it has been allowed. He doesn’t lean in to kiss him yet, he relishes the way Hannibal watches him, the way his hands feel against his cheeks, how close he is to him, just standing between Will’s legs at the counter.

Will sets his hands against him in turn, fingers curled still against his collarbone, spreading up over his neck and under Hannibal’s jaw. He can feel his pulse, usually so slow, so steady, now erratic and fluttering. It makes Will smile, and he swallows, gently, just once, before leaning in.

Hannibal’s lips tickle against his own before Will pushes them together, eyes closed and cheeks heating torrid as he wraps his arms over Hannibal’s shoulders and holds on, holds close, making a little noise when Hannibal reciprocates the kiss, when he finally breathes out warm over Will’s skin and gently turns his head to kiss him properly.

Soft curls tickle Hannibal’s cheek, and he sweeps them back with a gentle hand. Eyes closing, he follows Will’s lead in this, the student now and not the teacher. Lips touching languid, together and apart, holding firm only to ease again. Hannibal runs a hand down Will’s back and feels him shiver with it, and the quiet sound he makes could bring Hannibal to his knees.

They are both inexpert, both breathing too hard and too fast, bumping noses as they coordinate a breath only to meet again. Will’s skinny arms squeeze tighter around Hannibal’s neck, and he lifts a patient hand to his boy’s arm to slow him, and savor the softness of his lips as they crush ripe and bright against his own in adolescent eagerness.

And when Will spreads their mouths wide and Hannibal follows, and his boy’s tongue thrusts ready and twining against his own, Hannibal, then, is the one who yields a frail noise to this brave and beautiful boy. He sinks an arm around Will’s waist and pulls them close together, the other pressed to a blushing cheek.

Hannibal’s mouth is warm, tastes like coffee and something sweeter that Will assumes is just him. He wraps his legs slowly around Hannibal’s hips and holds on, drawing a hand through Hannibal’s hair and down to his neck again, catching little breaths when they part and press together again, smile wide enough that it makes it hard to kiss but Will tries anyway. Heart fluttering and so full he can barely breathe, he pulls back just to nuzzle Hannibal when he grows dizzy from it. Hannibal holds him close, a smile pressed to his shoulder as Will trembles again, in overwhelming pleasure from something so simple as a kiss.

A real, genuine kiss.

“I want to do that forever,” he whispers.

If Hannibal has ever heard anything as sweet as this, he cannot recall it.

If he has ever tasted anything as satisfying as Will’s lips beneath his own, he does not remember it now.

All at once Hannibal is old and young, torn between what he wants and is old enough to know he should not, and what he has missed just as much as Will - inside, young enough to ache for what was taken from him, too. He is this boy, they are each other, the small voice in Hannibal cries out for companionship of someone who understands and the man in whose body that voice resides swallows down the guilt that rises like bile from it.

He rests his forehead against Will’s, and turns his nose against a blushing cheek, breathing in the youthful heat of him, like sun-warmed peaches and fresh cream. He touches a kiss to the corner of Will’s mouth, just to feel him not flinch away.

He does not, and Hannibal rests his hips against the counter and sighs across Will’s cheek.

“Happy birthday, Will.”

Will doesn’t let him go, heart beating too quick and breath coming too fast and smile so wide it hurts him. Will bites his lip and turns his head against Hannibal’s, to breathe him in and feel him close, fingertips brushing over Hannibal’s his cheeks and jaw, thumb pressing his lips lightly out-of-shape.

“This is the best birthday,” he whispers, nosing gently against Hannibal before kissing him again, because he’s allowed, because they both want to. Because it feels good and Will loves him. “Thank you.”

Hannibal laughs, and it’s genuine, small but earnest, sighed warm. He lets his eyes slip closed and follows by sensation alone the movement of Will’s fingers over his lips, replaced by a kiss instead. He tracks them to his cheek, over his brow, across his eyes, learning every part of the man by touch now, to augment sight, and Hannibal in his sway entirely. Fingertips tap to the end of his nose, across his lips to his chin. Slender hands work graceful back through his hair. Hannibal tilts his head into his boy’s palm, and when Will brings it to him, Hannibal touches a kiss to its center.

He settles the weakness of his hands around Will’s lean waist, and wonders at the familiar and alien sensation of feeling as though he, himself, is Will’s age again, but now protected. And with someone, so close, who understands that particular fear that has haunted them both.

“I have missed you,” Hannibal murmurs, “I think, for a very long time.”

Will’s heart beats against his ears, against his throat, against his very bones. He curls his fingers to touch Hannibal’s face again, sits closer on the counter as Hannibal holds him, safe and strong. Will never wants him to let him go.

“I’m here,” he tells him, knowing, then, that no matter what happened he would not go. He could not leave Hannibal. If he remembered who he was, if someone, somehow, found him, he would not go. He does not want to. He never wants to leave Hannibal again. “I’m not going anywhere.”

It’s a promise, a vow that Will knows they both understand, both still scared, of themselves mostly, of pressures out of their control besides. Will wants them to go away, he wants to be with Hannibal, wants to help him save children, wants to help him make this place better. He wants to do good that was done to him.

Hannibal leans, a little more, and settles his cheek against Will’s shoulder. The boy ruffles pleased, smiling bright at the older man’s gentleness, and he strokes again through Hannibal’s hair.

“At least,” Hannibal sighs, “you are easy to shop for.”

Will blinks, and then furrows his brow a little. “Easy to -”

“If this is all you wish for your birthday,” Hannibal murmurs.

A moment more of surprise and Will laughs again, cheeks pink and eyes bright, and holds Hannibal against him. He does not regret his decision, he needs nothing else. He wants nothing else. He would accept anything Hannibal gave him but this - this is something he had asked for on his own, had fought for, had found well worth the time and effort.

“This is what I wish,” he agrees, carding soft through Hannibal’s hair before turning his cheek against it, holding him close until both their hearts settle to a steadier rhythm. They can train today, they can practice Thai, they can run - and Will still hates it, despite the months of having done it now - and he would not care. As long as he can come home to this man and press against him, and push little kisses to his lips and feel them returned, he will do anything.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“If something happened to me -”_
> 
> _“Yes.”_
> 
> _“You would save me again, wouldn’t you?”_
> 
> **PLEASE READ ALL WARNINGS IN THE NOTES BELOW**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a triggering chapter and we would caution people going in. As with all of our stories with such content, we believe that it is vital for the development of the story, but it does bring to light some rather frightening things. We want our readers to be safe, so if any of the warnings mentioned below make you feel uncomfortable, we urge you to give this chapter a miss.
> 
> This chapter contains graphic mentions of non-con, abuse of a minor, derogatory language and violence. None of the warnings apply to the main characters together, but they are about Will. Careful going in, troops, we love you!
> 
> Beta'd by the fearless [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

_“I’m going out.”_

_“Take me with you.”_

_“No. There is ample food in the kitchen if you are hungry -”_

_“I’m not hungry, I want to go with you.”_

_“And I said no, Will. Eat and sleep. And -”_

_“And that’s it.”_

_“Will.”_

_“I’ve worked so hard. I work hard every day. I eat when I’m supposed to and I sleep when I’m supposed to and I only have nightmares once in a while, Hannibal, and my Thai is good enough now -”_

_“Not perfect.”_

_“It shouldn’t be! Why would it be? It should be a little wrong, don’t you think? I wasn’t born here, maybe I picked it up, but then -”_

_“Breathe.”_

_“Please.”_

_“And if I do not? If I choose - because it is my choice - to go without you, then what? You have an answer for everything, more than I do when I ask myself what I would do if something happened to you there - if someone drove you to breaking after we have worked so hard to make you strong -”_

_“I would wait. I would wait for you to come home. I would eat and do the dishes but I wouldn’t sleep. I would stay awake like I do every time you go out and I’m afraid you won’t come back. I would wait.”_

_“If something happened to you, Will - not even physically, though that’s certainly a very real possibility. If something happened that hurt you deeper than that - I brought you from there. I brought you and I let you stay because I never wanted you to see those places again -”_

_“If something happened to me -”_

_“Yes.”_

_“You would save me again, wouldn’t you?”_

Hannibal would. He frets for the distraction, for the change in a rhythm he has learned over years of practice and refinement, but he would not let his boy go again. Not to anyone, now, be it a trafficker or the Embassy. Will’s curls are soft beneath Hannibal’s hand, his lips softer still when Will touches them to Hannibal’s wrist. It is the wrong choice to bring him.

And just another questionable decision to add to an ever-increasing list.

He tucks his fingers beneath Will’s chin, sighing when the boy steps closer and slips his arms around Hannibal’s waist. They stand just so, as Hannibal wonders at the softness of Will’s neck where he strokes long fingers, at the lithe strength in his little limbs. He wonders how this boy, gentle and kind and clever, survived that hell for so long.

Because he is strong.

And because, Hannibal knows, the will to live surpasses all other drives.

Stepping back, Hannibal mutes Will’s sound of dismay with a finger against his lips. “Do you remember what we discussed?”

Will blinks, eyes wide as he nods.

“Tell me,” Hannibal insists. 

Will swallows, obediently stepping back enough to free his lips from the gentle silencing. He takes a breath.

"You are a smuggler looking to make a sale," he says, eyes glazing as the first time they had come up with the plan, Will resting his head against Hannibal's lap then, murmuring ideas together. "You are welcoming a trade instead of money, for services rendered by another - the two kids the man has now."

Will's jaw works and he takes a slow breath through his nose. He tries not to think how he has seen this happen before, how some of the boys had come to be in the same filthy, stifling room as Will by this kind of trade, how he had been traded for them, sometimes.

He shakes his head and tugs the hem of his shirt, twisting it around and around his fingers.

"You will haggle, I will count our exits and potential threats, cry them to you in French when he takes me away, and -"

And.

And then Will would be on his back in a dirty bed, pressed there by reeking breath and sweaty hands and a fat stomach, the man’s cock working to stiffness as he rubs over Will, tells him he will be so good to such a pretty boy...

No.

No. Not again.

"And then you kill him," Will says, "and we leave."

“Yes,” Hannibal breathes. He strokes the back of his knuckles down Will’s cheek to bring him back for a moment more, to ground him from the fear that Hannibal can see pull his eyes wide and his brow furrowed. When Will steps closer again, Hannibal does not stop him. When small hands wrap in his shirt, and Will tugs himself to his toes, Hannibal does not stop him.

When soft lips press clumsy against his own, Hannibal does not stop him.

He does not instigate, he does not lead, he has never kissed Will first but for his birthday, but he does not stop him.

If he’s honest, he doesn’t want to.

When they part and Will sinks back to his heels, Hannibal’s eyes suggest a smile that does not move his mouth. It is a wonder that a boy of fourteen could be so strong, a fascination that Will adapts so readily to his environments, and in truth, he doesn’t know what to expect from this venture. There is equal chance of their shared success as there is that Will is swept away in the moment, that he forgets Hannibal and forgets himself, overcome by the memories of too many years’ torment.

“Would that you were not so persistent,” Hannibal sighs, “and stubborn.”

Will takes the praise as just that, and manages a fleeting grin.

They seek a taxi in front of the hotel, switching to a tuk-tuk closer to their destination. Hannibal speaks little, only to point out particular landmarks of interest - to teach, to help if Will is separated from him and needs to find his way back - and Will sits stoic and silent beside him. Hannibal can all but hear his heart struggling to hammer past his ribs, and reaches out to press a hand against Will’s knuckles.

Little fingers twine with his own, and squeeze.

They go back into the labyrinth of the city, the filth and sprawl of it. The heat. The tuk-tuk takes them only far enough in, the alleys too narrow where they need to be, and it takes Will a long moment of hesitation before he disembarks.

His feet no longer touch the ground bare, he is clothed comfortably, he is well fed and not limping, no bruises hurt his skin, no cuts mar it. He is not the boy going in that Hannibal had pulled out months ago.

"He was left," Will whispers. "Left, and three blocks in we turn right."

They had discussed this, planned it, as much as they possibly could, with the factors against them. Will had memorized the route they would need to take, memorized the route home. He had learned all the street names, learned all the vendors, knew where to turn so as to avoid the police and pursuit.

Hannibal’s fingers fan closed into a fist, and flex one by one open again. A bare movement, to replace how much he wants to stroke Will’s hair from his face and rub the tension from his back. A bare movement to allow some small release of energy from all that coils so tightly his abdominal muscles ache from it. More often, this crescendo is reached as Hannibal is reaching for the man whose neck he will neatly snap that night - never in the street, never before.

Given freedom from his self-assigned obligation, Hannibal would use that ferocity to snare Will away from here - from this city, from this country - and never let him see these streets again.

Instead, with a slow tilt of his head, he asks in French, “And if something goes wrong.”

Will shoves his glasses up on his nose - his own prescription now, elucidating the illumination of all the neon around them. “If something…”

“Goes wrong.”

“I know the way back,” Will whispers. “If we’re sep- separated.”

Hannibal’s throat is too tight to swallow, and so he sighs instead. “And if we are not.”

“Run to you,” he answers. “And you’ll fix it.”

“Always.”

"Always." Will nods, he waits, just a minute, and then he brushes his hand against Hannibal’s, just knuckles to knuckles. "Okay."

Without a word, Will steps closer to him, hunches his shoulders, clasps his hands before himself and waits. He cannot help but jerk when Hannibal sets a hand against the back of his neck, just holding for now, not cruel.

They walk.

Three blocks, then to the right. Beats upon beats, rhythm upon rhythm until it becomes a discord of white noise and shivering sounds, and Will can do nothing but swallow and walk ahead.

If something goes wrong...

He is too frightened to think of how much could. He can feel his throat constrict, can feel the nausea creeping up his throat, his breathing quicken and grow shallow. He is scared. He is so scared.

"You have a nice boy," a voice calls out, rough and accented. Will does not look up. "Very nice boy. You sell? I pay good and treat nice. He is pretty, he will go well."

Hannibal lifts a hand, the universal sign for disinterest. He marks two steps before the proprietor’s voice rings out again.

“I’ll make you a very good offer,” the man says, this time in Thai. Hannibal lets his gaze settle on the unsteady words wavering in glowing red, reflected from the puddle at his feet. Already an agreement of sorts is struck, shared languages means shared understanding, and Hannibal’s deliberate hesitation is as much an admission as if he confessed on the spot.

When Hannibal turns, his hand pressed against the back of Will’s neck to move him along, the man is smiling.

“I know a businessman when I see one,” the man says, the harsh shout now died down to a sinuous confidence with Hannibal. “You should come inside. We’ll talk, like businessman together.”

The muscles beneath Hannibal’s eyes draw up, an altogether separate movement from the tug of muscle forced to the corners of his mouth.

“Like businessman,” he agrees. He turns to follow the man around back - never through the front with one so young, too many questions - and Hannibal pushes Will ahead of him. The gesture hidden, he strokes his thumb against Will’s neck, just once, in silent reassurance.

Inside, there is less music, more smells. Old food and new food, sweat and heat. Sex. Will is led on ahead and pushed into a chair when the man indicates for them to sit. Hannibal sits after, behind him, hand against his shoulder in a way that is unmistakable. 

Ownership.

Control.

"So. We talk." The man smiles, teeth surprisingly clean, surprisingly even, bright against his dark skin.

“You mentioned a very good offer,” Hannibal reminds him. His voice is silken and smooth over the coarse language, framing it in elegance. He brooks no uncertainty in his words but manifests the calm of someone who has done this before, many times. “So offer.”

“We should drink first -”

“We drink after,” Hannibal says, flat. The man - starting to rise - settles again with open palms, and regards Will at length. Dark eyes take him in, lingering not on his eyes and with no gentleness, but seeking his mouth, his frame, searching for bruises or signs of wear. He studies him as one might when choosing an animal for slaughter, or a piece of used furniture.

“He’s a beautiful boy. Well-cared for. Healthy.”

“Very,” Hannibal assures the man.

“American?”

“No.”

The man makes an approving sound at this. Traffickers are always wary of dealing in Americans - too much money in the country as a whole not to care for one of their own going missing, and too much risk when there are easier places to pluck from. He doesn’t ask for more details than that, for now, and settles back into his seat with arms spread wide across the back.

“Five hundred.”

Hannibal snorts. “I thought you were a businessman.”

He leans forward, and runs a hand over Will’s brow, smoothing back his hair. Slipping the hand from his shoulder, he holds Will’s jaw - a cruel motion, but gentle in touch, as soft as he can - to turn his head from side to side. When Will begins to shake beneath his hands, Hannibal does not stop him, but inwardly hopes - nearly prays - that it is only an act, that he is not with every moment ripping loose the seams of trust that have so painstakingly stitched them together.

“He is a beautiful boy,” Hannibal says. “Kind and obedient. Old enough to know how to behave. And young enough still to appeal. Five hundred is an insult,” he murmurs, lips curling across his teeth at the words. “And in truth, I have not come to sell.”

"Not to sell?" The man raises an eyebrow, brings a hand to his lips and draws his fingers over them. It is hunger, it is a sick desire for power, not only over something so small, so helpless, but for wanting to take it from someone else.

So he does not have it anymore.

"Five hundred for a night, perhaps?" he offers.

Hannibal scoffs, and against his hand, Will shivers, eyes bright behind his glasses as he looks between Hannibal and the man they are hunting. This is too close, too much, only now he can understand. Now he can understand the words being spoken, unlike the first time when he sat sobbing in a corner, the harsh language hissed at him, laughter too loud, breath reeking -

"What would you do with him?"

"And if I wanted to do everything?" the man asks in return, sitting forward. "Touching and tasting and fucking... what would your beautiful boy be worth for that?"

The words snare, tearing at Hannibal’s skin like fishhooks. He lets them. He lets every one sink into his skin and hold, pull, tear until he’s forced to take a breath, easing it into another narrow smile. Soon enough, he will shred this man’s flesh just the same as all those boys whose bodies he’s broken.

Soon enough.

And yet, as Will issues a low sound beneath his breath, there can be no resolution soon enough. Hannibal sets a hand to Will’s shoulder, once more, not stroking but merely providing a weight.

Reassurance.

“Surely you have something to offer in return.”

“I am already letting you name your price,” the man points out, and Hannibal dips his head in cool acknowledgment of this.

“I am disinterested in money. And surely a businessman such as yourself does not come without his own wares to offer?”

The man slicks his tongue across his teeth and narrows his eyes at Hannibal in thought, before asking suddenly:

“Is he yours?”

Hannibal lifts a brow, head tilting just so.

“Your son.”

Will swallows hard, makes a little sound he can’t control and turns his eyes to Hannibal. He studies his silhouette, remembers how it looks in the dark cool of their room when he sleeps, how never once it had snarled in anger or cruelty. He thinks of that and breathes. Slowly, carefully, he breathes.

"My nephew."

The man laughs, seemingly delighted by this. Depraved, wrong in the most glorious way.

"Nephew," he repeats, laughing again, shaking his head. "Must not be a very good boy, then." For a moment he says nothing more, then, gesturing for Hannibal to wait, he gets up and moves further into the house.

Will releases a breath, shaking hard, now, where Hannibal holds him. "Two," he whispers. "Bargain for two. Agree to anything he asks, okay."

Hannibal dams up the expression that he can feel threatening to spill forward and burst. Just a look, just a softness around his eyes, relaxing the muscles that he has held tight and trained to a superhuman specificity. He does not allow it. He isn’t sure he could recover if he did.

Instead, his jaw works, tongue across his teeth, curling up his lips in the patient snarl of a predator waiting for precisely the right moment that the prey stumbles. He lifts his fingers from Will’s shoulder, and strokes them cool down the boy’s hot, ruddy cheek.

“Brave Will,” Hannibal whispers, sighing and sitting a little straighter still as the man returns.

“This is what I have. You can have whatever one you like,” he says, motioning to the two children pushed lightly to stand before him. A brother and sister, perhaps, or near enough in appearance and age. As little as Will once must have been. Silent, motionless where they stand.

Hannibal imagines in that moment that if he might find the part inside his chest that splinters like aged bone each time this happens, he would remove it himself, with scalpel in hand. He reminds himself in the next moment that his suffering - then or now - pales in compare.

“Both,” Hannibal says, uplifting his eyes with a wider smile. “Not to keep, merely to borrow. And in exchange, this one, for as long as you like. For,” he says, “anything you like.”

"Please don't," Will whispers, eyes bright, turning quickly to Hannibal. He holds his eyes, feels the warmth there behind the indifference. "I'll be good -"

"You will be good," Hannibal tells him. Then he looks away, motions for the man to lead the children closer as he pushes Will away. For a moment, one terrifying moment, Will’s heart stops. What if he lets him go? What if this was the easiest way to return Will, release all responsibility?

What if this was the plan, from day one? To feed him and clean him, make him healthy and beautiful and sell him back?

"Hannibal?" Will's voice wavers, whimpers, and time seems to stop when Hannibal doesn’t answer him. Will swallows, eyes dark in anger, in fear, and hope, agonizing, chilling hope.

Then someone grabs his arm and Will opens his mouth to scream in French. "The door we came from, another behind the television, hidden, two windows, Hannibal -"

The man wraps a hand over Will’s mouth to smother his words, laughing in a knowing exasperation as he meets Hannibal’s eyes and shakes his head. Kids these days. He jerks Will nearly from his feet before taking him back to the room from which he came, and every plaintive, muffled sob from Will is like a hammer against Hannibal’s ribs. They crack, one by one, as for a moment - perhaps the first, ever, in a time like this - Hannibal can do no more than watch.

“Hannibal!”

Her voice cuts through the room, through time and space and reason, and shackles gouge into Hannibal’s wrists. Bitter winter wind blows against his skin, driving snow enough to blind him, to freeze his heart within his chest so suddenly that it would shatter into a thousand little pieces before ever unthawing. He breathes her name, his breath pooling in the air, and the sensation is so foreign, it is enough to snap him to movement.

Long strides take him to the children, who cower. The boy begins to weep and Hannibal kneels, his Thai falling fluid and futile. They stare, braced and uncomprehending. He curses and tries Vietnamese. Tagalog. Battered half-words that he hardly knows plucked like burrs from his memory where they’ve stuck and held. Cambodian draws the glitter of awareness, and he tells them in broken speech to go, out, he says, pointing towards the door - street, left, police help.

 _Now_.

She snatches her brother by the hand and pulls him, animal instinct emerging from where humanity has been forcibly repressed, and on bare, quick feet they bolt.

From the hall, comes a weak, whimpering little cry for help, a sharp slap of skin against skin and hissed threats honeyed in a slick tone. _Stay still. Be good. I'll have you crying soon, little one, don't start so soon -_

Hannibal does not wait, does not think, he moves down the hall where Will had been pulled, to the room he was dragged to. It is clean, unusual for such an establishment, well-appointed. It is not the room the children were held captive in. It is the proprietor’s own space, his own sick amusement prison.

Will looks tiny beneath him, face down, glasses knocked to the floor, shirt wrinkled and yanked up high over his chest where one large hand fondles a nipple. The other holds against the back of Will’s neck, pinning him down.

Little legs struggle, but they are held wide. The man slips his hand down to grasp between Will’s thighs and yank him closer, his hips up. The little boy beneath him is terrified, tears slick down his cheeks, lips drawn back over gritted teeth as he sobs, as he grabs against the blankets and tries to crawl free.

A flash of pale skin bares as the man jerks down Will’s pants to around his thighs, but they go no further than that. Firm fingers set around his wrist and he blinks, bewildered, lifting his gaze to Hannibal beside him. The man draws a breath to question, to curse, but it never finds its exit as Hannibal snaps a hand across his mouth and drags him off the bed and to the floor.

Hannibal has always prided himself on his efficiency. Cold and collected, he restrains the anger that explodes in his chest to instead quickly and quietly end those who cause it.

Not now.

Not with Will sobbing against the bed.

No, in this moment, Hannibal wants nothing more than to fill the man with the terror he has caused in so many.

The brother and sister.

Will.

 _Mischa_.

Hannibal shoves his hands against the man’s throat, cartilage crackling like bubbling hot oil in a pan. Wet choking sounds take the place of gasps as the man struggles. He heaves his body upward, kicks his feet thudding against the floor, gouges his nails into Hannibal’s wrists deep enough to draw blood and finding no release, he reaches for his face. Spine curving, Hannibal leans away enough to duck them, and his lips curl in a snarl.

Hannibal pushes harder.

The man’s pulse quickens to a blur beneath his fingers. His face purples, eyes bulging and tongue grotesquely fat between his lips. The movement of his hands, clawing for freedom, become shaking and unsteady, hooking against Hannibal’s jacket, his shirt, clinging to the man who takes life from him as desperately as he clings to life itself.

Hannibal pushes harder.

Just clicking now, weak and strangely loud in the space, just sounds of nails scrabbling against fabric, legs kicking against the floor. Again, again, until that stops too, and then there are just the little weak sobs from the bed, breaths harsh and trembling so prominent it is a vibration against the mattress.

Will is curled up, hands grasping for his pants to pull them up again, tugging down his shirt, covering himself up. He is back there again, back in the filthy bed, back beneath a heavy body, spreading his legs for a hard cock that is too large for his little form. He feels sick. He feels dirty. He is terrified, still, that Hannibal will not return to him, that he will see him like this and leave him here to be found by someone else.

He makes a frightened little sound when he feels a hand in his hair, shaking harder and trying to bury himself in the messy sheets.

“Breathe,” Hannibal tells him. He does not stop stroking Will’s hair as once he might have, he does not hold himself back in wariness. Long curls of his fingers, gentle tugs, palm slipping to his back. “Listen to my voice, Will. Breathe.”

The whimper pushed against the bed is enough for Hannibal to know there is breath to fuel it. He will not collect from this man tonight, it takes time to do and he will not make Will be here longer than he has already. No, it doesn’t matter, there will always - he thinks with a snarl - there will always be others.

Instead, Hannibal slips his arms around Will and lifts him from the bed that smells like sweat and smoke. He ignores the thrashing of Will’s body, although the boy is strong enough now to stagger Hannibal into taking another step, and he holds Will against his chest, seating him on his hip, an arm around his waist and fingers stroking his hair from his face.

“You’re safe,” Hannibal tells him, forcing his voice to a steadiness not readily found. He imagines a smaller frame in his arms, clinging to him with numb fingers and sighing out wavering little grey breaths. Hannibal holds him tighter, pressing his tongue past his lips and murmuring, “You are with me now, Will. Stay with me.”

He ducks, snaring Will’s glasses from the ground and balancing the boy on his hip. They’re folded and slipped into his coat pocket, and Hannibal seeks exit with Will in his arms.

Little hands slip around Hannibal’s neck, fingers cold from panic and fear, heart beating quick against Hannibal’s shoulder where his little chest presses. He breathes hot against Hannibal’s cheek, his own wet, still, with tears. He is still trembling, still shaken with the memories that have rushed back. He forces himself to remember he is not there anymore.

He is not.

He is here.

He is with Hannibal, and he is safe.

"Did we save them?" he whispers. "Did I help?"

One arm tucked under Will to keep him hoisted, Hannibal spreads the other up his back, tangling fingers in his hair. When the door opens to the sinuous alley writhing narrow between buildings, Hannibal is for a moment startled to feel sticky humidity press against his skin, rather than the driving snow.

“Brave Will,” Hannibal whispers, as he seeks for safer streets. “You are so courageous. I could not have asked for more and I should not have asked for this.”

Will’s hitching breath against his neck singes the man and he adjusts Will to hold him higher, legs dangling. Hannibal does not care who sees them right now, nor what they think or assume of it. They are noticed, certainly, and with the amount of time Hannibal has spent in this district - far more than he would normally dare - he wonders if they should not move to Pattaya soon, instead.

Or home.

A real home, where Will need not ever find himself pinned behind another again, where he need not ever been groped with hands and roving eyes, where he need not ever again think of the implications behind asking if he is Hannibal’s son.

Hannibal grasps Will’s curls and murmurs against his hair as he stalks towards a main thoroughfare, ignoring the calls and lights that spark around them.

“You helped them,” Hannibal whispers. “You. My sweet and fearless Will. They are safe because of you.”

Will hears him, he listens. He lets the words warm him, he allows the soft touches and does not cringe away from them. He is not being cruelly bent, not anymore. He is not being struck or raped, not anymore. He is held safe, and his bravery saved two lives.

There is a strange heat and power that comes from this, a strange pride now that Will is no longer unsafe, now that he is in Hannibal’s arms, in a tuk-tuk on their way to the main strip and the taxis there. Will curls closer and nuzzles against Hannibal’s neck.

"I knew you would stop him," he whispers, voice little. "I knew you would because you promised." He swallows and bites his lip and flexes his sweaty fingers against Hannibal’s shoulder. "Next time I won’t cry. I know you'll save me."


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Even in the safety of their hotel room, Hannibal hesitates to let him go, and instead ducks their brows together and lets his eyes close in a wash of relief._
> 
> _“What do you need?” he asks. “Tell me and you will have it.”_

Hannibal only makes Will walk the length of the lobby. Little hand in his, Hannibal raises the other to the night reception and offers them a smile, genially returned.

That walk alone takes enough from the boy’s flagging energy that he nearly stumbles into the elevator, and Hannibal hoists him again. He has not stopped speaking to him since they left, words that say nothing and mean everything, or mean everything and seem to say little. Breathless whispers, pressed to adrenaline-cool skin, murmurs as ceaseless as the beating of their hearts.

Even in the safety of their hotel room, Hannibal hesitates to let him go, and instead ducks their brows together and lets his eyes close in a wash of relief.

“What do you need?” he asks. “Tell me and you will have it.”

Will hums and turns his head a little, over and over, nuzzling against Hannibal softly. He has calmed much more now, with their travel time, with little touches from Hannibal's warm, reassuring hands. His words. He considers the question and wonders if there is anything he does need, or anything that could help.

He is not as broken as he thought he would be. But he cannot let go of Hannibal if he tried.

He doesn’t try.

"I can still feel his hands on my skin," he whispers, swallowing and wrapping his arms tighter around Hannibal. "Can you make that go away? I just want to feel your hands..."

Hannibal wishes he could. He wishes that by snuffing out that man’s existence he could erase all trace of him left in memory or sensation, and wipe out all the harm he did with him. Instead, he thinks back to what he himself sought, so long ago, and cradling Will close, toes off his shoes on the way to the bedroom.

“A bath, I think, may help,” Hannibal murmurs, as more question than statement. A little nod rocks against his cheek and Hannibal hums, rumbling deep beneath Will’s hand seeking warmth against the older man’s chest.

With practiced balance, Hannibal leans to start the bath and fill the enormous tub with water hot enough to steam. He checks it with one hand, and satisfied, tilts Will back just enough to meet his eyes.

“Should I set you down?” he asks, his eyes suggesting a smile. “It would be difficult to take a bath just so.”

Will sets his hands to Hannibal's chest, now, gently curled, and he suddenly looks so young, so entirely little. He should be running around playing football, doing his homework, meeting his friends for video games and pizza. But his eyes, wide, blue, clear, have seen so much already, so much that no child should ever have to see.

With a blush, Will nods, and his own eyes warm on a smile as Hannibal sets him to the ground, draws a hand through warm curls again.

He is careful with his shirt, the buttons thankfully undamaged. He folds it on top of the toilet and moves to his pants, fingers shaking a little on the button though he refuses help when Hannibal steps close to offer it. He toes off his shoes and pulls down his pants and underwear, holding onto the bath to tug off his socks as well.

So bared, he braves a toe into the water, cringing at the heat before he sinks down into it without a word. He does not stretch out, sits with his hands wrapped around his legs, his chin against his knees, the water just lapping up against them.

"Please don't go?" he asks Hannibal softly.

Hannibal looks back only then, having averted his eyes to allow Will his privacy, yet not having left for some lingering need in the man himself to stay close, as if his presence alone might be enough to chase off snarling the ghosts that haunt his boy. He considers the question, and knows even as he hesitates that he could no more deny Will this than anything else he asks.

Hannibal nods, once, and sheds his coat. He removes Will’s glasses to set on the sink, and hangs his jacket on the door. His movements are studiously slow, nothing too sudden or severe, and Hannibal sits on the edge of the bath, to be near but not to watch.

“For as long as you need,” Hannibal agrees. “Or until the water begins to cool. I will not have you missing study for catching a cold.”

Will’s lips quirk and he lifts his eyes to Hannibal to watch him, tilting his head to rest his cheek against his knee instead. Even now, Hannibal averts his eyes from Will’s naked form not in disgust but in respect. Even now, he would not reach to take advantage of Will’s vulnerability. He feels his heart swell in his chest and bites his lip.

"I won't," he promises.

It takes time, but slowly, Will unravels from his tight ball into the warm water, legs outstretched and toes spreading and relaxing again. No new bruises mark his skin, though he knows they could have, no new pain threatens to pull frowns and worry from him, though he knows just how close he came.

He shifts around, careful not to splash the water to the floor, and sets his head against Hannibal's thigh. There is an understood permission in this, established in stops and starts over their months together. Hannibal will not touch him first, unexpected, unless strictly necessary, and it is known between them that Will gives his consent and request for contact by seeking Hannibal first.

Hannibal settles his fingers against Will’s head, twining curls between them. He recalls how thin and brittle it was at first, even after washing, malnutrition and neglect taking their toll. Hannibal would spend whole mornings tidying up fallen hair from the bathroom floor. By contrast, the thick strands that coil around his fingers now are strong and soft as silk, and Hannibal strokes them almost reverently.

“How far you’ve come,” Hannibal tells him, voice gentled by a quiet wonder. “I do not know if you can see it from where you are, but given time and distance, given space to grow, you will someday look back and know why I am in awe of you.”

His throat clicks, and with a languid stretch, he reaches for the soap, dipping it into the water and lathering it into his hand. He rubs Will’s back, giving the touch that Will requested from him, to wipe away the memory of ungentle cruelty.

“It took me many years to see it in myself,” Hannibal says. “Even now, there are days when I cannot see it at all. When I awaken not as myself, now, and not even with my family, gone now for decades. Those times when I still awaken to the sensation of rough hands doing harm to me, as you have felt. I do not know that it ever goes away, in truth, but it fades. The memories become distant and faint. Perhaps you will take comfort as I do in knowing that despite the hurt they have done you, you have survived them, and grown more than they ever might.”

Will tenses a little at the touch but does not reject it, lets it lather away the rough hands of before that held him down and promised torment. He brings a hand up to rub his cheek, pink from where he had been slapped for his disobedience. He’s almost forgotten what it is like to be disciplined in such a way.

Hannibal's words, however, provide a good distraction, allow him to concentrate on the intricacies within, used, now, to Hannibal’s affinity for not saying anything while saying a lot. He turns a little for Hannibal to wash his chest too, and lifts his eyes to the man, looks until he meets them.

"Who hurt you?" he asks.

Hannibal holds Will’s gaze for a moment, and there is distance in his expression, but not pain as he answers.

“Other boys, in the orphanage where I was sent. Older than me. Stronger. I was very small,” he says. “Perhaps seven, by then. For years, I resided there - to say I lived would be too generous a way to describe that existence. I did not speak when I arrived, and after a time, found that I no longer could. Whether it would have mattered if I had described what was being done to me -”

His brows draw inward, and then ease.

“It does not matter now.”

He washes Will as gently as if the boy were porcelain, and not the tougher stuff that Hannibal knows him to be. He does not skim his hand onto the boy’s stomach or below, just above, slow enough that each touch is broadcast and no movement of it is a surprise.

“What moved me to finally act against them, I do not know. Sudden retaliations seemingly possessed me, and did little more than anger my attackers. And so when they came for me, in a group, I think that I understood that if I did not defend myself, I would never leave that building again.”

Will’s lips part on a little sigh, blinking wide.

“I killed them,” Hannibal answers to his unspoken question. “Each one who had ever set his hands against my skin.”

Will swallows, lips barely parted now before he closes them together again, and does not take his eyes off of Hannibal. This brave, strong man who had been built the same way Will had, who had found his strength alone in a dark place with no help and no voice.

Will wishes he was as strong, wishes he was as clever and quick and good.

He thinks deeper on Hannibal’s words, how he will not see it in himself even if he is, even as he is.

He reaches to take Hannibal’s hand, still slick with soap, and clasps it between his own fingers, warming and rinsing it beneath the water before bringing it to his lips to kiss, eyes closing and cheeks warming at the show of tenderness.

"I wish I had been there," he says gently. "I wish I had saved you like you saved me."

Hannibal sighs, a sound near-silent that releases the mothwing-flutters of unease fluttering against his ribs. He eases, and accepts the little kisses with a stroke of fingers against Will’s cheek, cradling his face as the boy nuzzles into his palm.

“You are,” Hannibal murmurs. “Every time that you grant me the privilege of your trust, and allow me to try to make the world right for you again.”

Hannibal sets aside the thoughts of what occurred mere hours before - there is time enough to chastise himself to exhaustion later as he lays motionless and feigning sleep. The script is written - he should not have agreed to bring Will with him, he should have fought and insisted that Will not be exposed to that pain ever again - but merely in need of performance.

It can wait.

Will mumbles something against him but does not repeat it when Hannibal gently lifts his chin. They don't wash Will’s hair, and the boy takes just a few minutes to wash between his legs and down to his toes before getting out of the bath. He is wrapped in a large fluffy towel and told to dress, as Hannibal empties the bath and cleans it quickly.

Will finds a pair of his briefs and a warm shirt that was once Hannibal's and returns to the bathroom to set the towel away.

He does not want dinner, shaking his head gently when it's offered. He accepts tea, reluctantly, but follows Hannibal around the apartment the entire time, no doors between them. He tugs his shirt down against his thighs, chews the side of his thumb, lets his eyes rest in the middle distance.

Hannibal can feel the pull against him wherever he goes - watched when he is thought not to notice, drawn closer to when the thread of distance is stretched too far. He does not let it stop him from attending to their makeshift home as he would any other night, picking up a sock here, washing a dish to set away. Quiet rhythms that thrum in a steady heartbeat of stability to keep them both grounded.

“It will be morning soon,” Hannibal comments, after a time. “You should try to sleep, if you can.”

He folds a towel thrice and then in half again, and sets it two inches from the sink.

“So should you,” Will responds, and Hannibal allows a slight smile.

“I will try,” he answers. “Go and rest. I will flush and dress the scratches on my wrist, first, and change.” All actions broadcast clearly, all motions described before he takes them. Stability and reassurance. “Would you care for the bed alone tonight? I do not mind the sofa.”

"No," Will shakes his head hard, back and forth, and folds his hands over his chest almost protectively. "I just - I will - please don't make me sleep alone. I c- I don’t know if I could sleep alone."

Hannibal just inclines his head, the gesture alone enough to soothe Will’s panic. He does not make the boy leave him as he gathers the first aid kit, but he gently suggests Will goes to prepare the bed for them instead of helping. So Will goes, little steps and turning on the light before he goes into the room. He pulls back the sheets and heavy duvet and crawls in to sit on Hannibal’s side of the bed.

He listens to the reassuring sounds of Hannibal moving in the other room, breaths steady even as he disinfects the scratches, washes them gently clean and wraps them in a soft bandage. Will watches the door until he sees Hannibal standing in it, and then he slowly moves to sit on his side of the bed again, wrapping his arms around his knees once more.

As Hannibal does not watch Will when Will undresses, Will does watch him. He always watches. The strong back with its scars and marks, the arms that move gracefully and elegantly, slim hips, thighs, strong legs... Will swallows and buries his face against his knees, blushing, wondering why his body responds so readily to Hannibal this way, when he has never once asked for anything, never once made him.

If Hannibal notices the boy’s quiet unease, he says nothing to it. He only excuses himself, politely, to change his underwear in the bathroom and not in front of Will. Once he is clothed again, in simple sleep pants, he opens the door and brushes his teeth, taking in the lines of his face in the mirror, the grey hairs growing silver.

Exhaustion, emotional as much as physical, weighs his limbs as he shuts off the lights and moves to sit on his side of the bed.

“Thank you for turning down my sheets,” he says, before scrubbing his face with his hands and issuing a sigh, and slowly bringing his legs up to lay long across the bed. “Your glasses, should you need them, are beside the sink.”

Will just nods, waits for Hannibal to settle before laying down himself and wriggling closer beneath the covers to rest his head just near Hannibal's arm. He waits a minute more before burrowing beneath it until Hannibal relents and with a sigh lifts his arm for Will to slip beneath, head against his chest now.

Little hands settle to Hannibal's chest and he breathes the man in, a comfortably masculine smell, never overpowering or dirty. He smells like Hannibal, and Will thinks he would know that smell anywhere. He nuzzles a little higher to the warm hair on Hannibal’s chest and presses a soft kiss to his skin.

"Will."

"I want to."

Hannibal holds his breath a moment, and releases it slowly, choosing his words one by one.

“I do not doubt that,” he says. “But after duress, one does not always think clearly about what is best. Actions of instinct.”

“It isn’t only now,” Will whispers. “I want to all the time.”

“What one wants is not always what is best for them.”

“Is it wrong?” he asks, and Hannibal lets his eyes slip closed beneath the gentle demands. “Is it wrong to want to do this?”

“No,” Hannibal answers. He will not shame the boy for his feelings, much as he doubts Will’s understanding of them. He will not inflict on him a morality that would show its true emptiness in the context of the world in which they live. He will not make Will feel guilty, or embarrassed, and he will not let himself linger on the coil of heat that Will’s affection and company warms in his own belly.

“It is not wrong to seek this from - from peers, from others more like yourself,” he says carefully. “Your age, rather than mine.”

Will makes a fussy sound of displeasure and nuzzles closer, wrapping his arms around Hannibal as he can reach. He lays tense until Hannibal sets a hand to his hair and strokes there, giving in with a sigh. Just for now.

"Age doesn't matter. Age shouldn't matter," Will explains softly. "Do you feel how you calm me? You touch me, just once, and I feel safe, I feel warm and secure and -" Will bites his lip and lifts his head just a little. "Trust matters. I trust you."

Hannibal works his fingers a little deeper to settle Will once more against his chest, as much for the effect it has on calming his heart as for making Will unable to see the conflict drawing lines down Hannibal’s face. He is past the point of how he _should not_ feel about Will. He does feel, and he feels intensely enough that he has been unable to stop it.

_What one wants is not always what is best for them._

“All the more reason,” Hannibal murmurs, “that I do not wish to offend your faith in me. All the more reason that I do not wish for you to act in such a way that you will regret. I will hold you, Will, I will touch your hair and rub your back, but -”

“But it calms you too,” Will interrupts, looking up again, wide-eyed in the dark. Hannibal’s eyes are closed, his lips thinned in a vague moue of displeasure, lines creasing his brow and beside his mouth. Will can feel the strain of the man’s struggle, and lifting a hand, touches across his cheek. “You don’t want it to, but it does, and so you want what you - what you don’t want.”

Hannibal exhales a sigh, eyes opening towards the ceiling as if to seek a god he knows has never answered him before. His lips part as Will skims his fingers across them, and against his touch he breathes:

“Yes.”

A quiet sound, a stubborn lack of understanding, or a stubborn refusal to, and Will nuzzles down against Hannibal again. His heart beats slow, a reassuring rhythm for Will to time his own to. He knows why Hannibal fears it so. Knows that he is scared of becoming the men that had once abused Will, that had once abused Hannibal. But how could he compare himself to them? How, when he is so gentle and caring and kind?

Will tries again, another attempt to seek a cuddle, and kisses Hannibal's neck this time, a small and almost childish press of lips.

"You promised you wouldn’t give me up," he says, not an accusation, though he can feel Hannibal tense beneath him. "Right?"

Hannibal takes a breath and holds it. Swallows. Releases it. Takes another.

"I promised, and I will not," he says. Will hums a soft sound of happiness at that, wriggling closer still, hooking a leg over Hannibal’s and settling in to almost straddle his thigh as he lies.

"Then we will be together anyway," Will points out.

Hannibal finally opens his eyes a little at this, though they nearly close again as soon as Will’s lips brush his neck once more. A sound resonates in him, more felt than heard, and he lifts his hand to tuck Will’s hair behind his ear.

“I cannot act freely,” he says. “Were I to misstep, mistouch, move too quickly or with impropriety, Will, you may wake up and see me as no better than they. I would not be, in truth.”

He sets his fingers to Will’s lips when he draws a breath in protest, and turns their foreheads together.

“Listen, please,” Hannibal all but begs him. “Do what you will. I will not stop you. If you wish something of me, ask, be honest, that has always been our agreement - I will explain what I can if you have questions but -”

This time, it’s Will who slips a hand between them and presses his fingertips to Hannibal’s mouth. And this time, Hannibal yields, and kisses them softly.

“Do what you will,” he whispers.

Will sighs and lets him kiss, lets him calm himself again, heart settling beneath Will’s other hand. He wants Hannibal to touch him too, he wants it to be natural and warm and gentle. And he knows, past Hannibal's quiet protests, past his protection of him, that he does as well.

"Only if you promise me something," Will says, smiling gently and moving his fingers so he can nuzzle Hannibal again, nose to nose. "I will ask, I will be honest, I will do... but please be the same with me. If it feels good, tell me, if it makes you happy, tell me. Respond as you want to respond. Just here, where we're safe to, okay?"

Will hums, sets his hands on either side of Hannibal’s face and waits for him to answer, waits for the softening of the skin at the corners of his eyes that tells him he is smiling, waits for the sigh, not so much of resignation as of exasperated allowance.

"Alright."

"Alright," Will grins, bites his lip briefly and then leans in to kiss him.

Hannibal’s sigh, still held, lowers to a warm rumble between them. He meets Will’s lips, pressed delicately to his own, and settles a hand against the boy’s chest. Will’s heart beats in eager staccato beneath his fingers, his skin smooth and hairless, no longer the emaciated child who followed him first to the hotel, but something more - in body, heart, and mind.

He tilts their brows together, relishing the wavering little breath that passes against his mouth, and murmurs, “This feels very good.” Parting his lips with his tongue, tasting against them toothpaste and tea and Will, sweet Will, he adds, “You make me happy.”

Hannibal slowly slips his hand from Will’s chest, passing it across a raised nipple, and he hushes Will with a fond grin when the boy shivers pleased at the sensation. Pressing his hand to Will’s back, just between his shoulders, Hannibal turns to his side and brings Will gently against his chest, seeking another kiss. Their lips touch together and part, only to draw closed once more, again and again, exploring each other through taste and breath and heat.

And that is all Will wants, the closeness and softness, the freedom to explore. He kisses as he is kissed, open-mouthed and fearless, he touches Hannibal's hair and strokes his skin, presses closer to him until they are breathless and tired and outside the sky starts to lighten.

Then Will just curls up against him, contented enough to almost be purring from it. He wants nothing else, nothing more than the comfort and gentleness and trust they share so easily together.

"I'm happy," he sighs. "I feel safe with you. I feel so good with you."

Hannibal brings a kiss to rest against Will’s brow, arms secure but not holding too tightly, firm enough for assurance but loose enough that if Will wished to slip away, he could do so easily. He strokes his thumbs against Will’s arms where they rest, and in a tangle of limbs and comfort, he rests.

“I could want for nothing more.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Will is exploring._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **NB:** To say we're nervous about the reaction to this one is a bit of an understatement. If you're still reading this series, then you've seen the tags and you know what you're in for. Ideally, you know us enough, too, to know that despite having some shameless smut out there, we're not wont to pursue solely salacious ends in stories with a more serious tenor.
> 
> To fall back on that ol' W&B caveat - trust us. Everything we're writing is there for a reason.
> 
>  **This chapter contains explicit underage sexual activity.** If you're not okay with this, we totally understand, and recommend skipping this one and reading the next chapter instead.
> 
> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/) who also functions as our editor, critic, and therapist.

Hannibal wakes not from the press of sun against his eyelids, but from a touch against his chest. Rigidity ripples through and in turn eases as his mind - somewhere between sleep and stirring - assures him of his safety in steps. He is not being moved. The hands are too small to belong to anyone capable of doing him harm. He is in bed, half-bare, and not waking from unconsciousness.

Still, he does not respond. He can smell the boy pressed against him, he knows - awake now entirely - that it is Will whose cautious fingers span through the hair on his chest. The slow stroking movements do not cease with Hannibal’s recognition of them, and so Will must think him still asleep.

Will’s nose brushes through the hair enough to stir them but not touch skin, and Hannibal listens to the breath he draws, intentionally quiet.

Will is exploring.

And Hannibal finds his greatest concern now in being awoken this way is in resisting the drowsy smile that begs at the corners of his mouth.

The gentle nuzzling continues, barely moving but still seeking, seeing how his fingers feel against Hannibal’s chest, how warm his skin is, how soft the hair and how slow the breath. Will touches as though Hannibal is the one fragile, as though he is the one that needs reassurance and the one that needs care. And Hannibal wonders if perhaps he does, if perhaps he gives Will that worry, if he pulls at that same spot that Will pulls in Hannibal to nurture and protect.

Lips move where fingers did, and Will’s breath heats against him now, as Will seeks a nipple and gently circles it with the tip of his nose. Hannibal wonders if Will has ever felt pleasure, has ever been taught, has ever learned, or knows how to pleasure himself. The tip of a warm tongue touches against Hannibal’s skin and he cannot help but respond.

Immediately, Will stops, pulls back, holds his breath in worry, and after a moment more of Hannibal feigning sleep, the gentle fingers return instead.

It was only a sound, a sigh worked across vocal chords to add the barest note to his breath, but enough to both startle Will and pique his curiosity. Hannibal tells himself not to let another noise pass, to stop this now, to catch Will’s hands and kiss his fingers and push him away. But the admissions and promises of the night before rise to the surface of his thoughts, however much the man is convinced that he is in the wrong, however much he knows intrinsically that it is not Will’s obligation or responsibility to set these terms.

And yet Will was not wrong, in his assessment of the conflict that warred across Hannibal’s features. And perhaps not wrong in wanting to care for the man in a way that Hannibal was not cared for when he was in Will’s place. He feels as young and inexperienced as the boy himself, two voices ringing dissonant between his ears.

Start and stop.

Begin and end.

Hannibal wonders how many other men have justified their misdeeds by telling themselves that these things are better learned with one who does not mean the other harm, than those who do harm deliberately.

His attention is snared from his thoughts, sudden and sharp as the little fingernails that curl gently into his skin. Raking through his chest hair, Will skims his touch across Hannibal’s nipples, which stiffen outside of his extraordinary control. He knows without opening his eyes that Will is watching him.

And when color darkens Hannibal’s cheeks and he allows his lips to part on a drowsy sigh, Will does it again.

He can feel Hannibal has properly woken by the way his heart beats faster, the way his breathing hitches and his lips finally smile. WIll smiles back, even though Hannibal keeps his eyes closed, even though he doesn’t move beyond how Will moves him, even though he shouldn’t, he mustn’t, but he does, and he will.

Will touches him and moves closer, using his hands as he has learned Hannibal likes, and moving to kiss too, to nuzzle more, to press his light weight against him. Will crawls over him gently, one leg and then the other as before, straddling his middle, and for a moment, he freezes.

Hannibal is hard, and Will wonders for a moment why, _why_ he does not feel the disgust he usually does at that sensation, why he doesn’t immediately curl up and try to protect himself. He gently rocks back and feels Hannibal rub up against him, between his legs. He shivers. He bites his lip and leans over Hannibal to press to him, head beneath his chin. Carefully, Will pushes his hips back again, and his cheeks darken when his own body responds in kind, when he too stiffens between his legs from this alone.

Hannibal opens his eyes. Just a little, enough for Will to see and know his awareness of what’s happening. Enough for Will to know that Hannibal is present. Here. And no less restrained than in his sleep.

An apology is perched on Hannibal’s lips but it breaks into a low breathy pleasure when Will rocks down against him again. They are both still in their clothes, Hannibal in sleep pants and Will in his shorts, kept from the bareness that might shock them both to stopping. Cautiously, carefully, Hannibal brings his hands up to Will’s knees and when the boy bites his lip, Hannibal pushes them just a little further down the mattress.

Their twin erections brush as Will lays flatter over Hannibal. Not beneath, not crushed, not held and not forced, but entirely in control of the older man who lifts his hands away again, to rest against the pillow on which he lays. It is an effort gladly undertaken to resist rocking up against Will in return, and in truth, pleasure enough to see the boy delighting himself in this way. He pushes his hands to Hannibal’s chest and rubs himself down firmer, seeking friction, the ridge of his cock grinding against Hannibal’s own.

Will sighs and ducks his head again, a smile on his lips too as he continues to shift and move, adjusting how he rubs, where he pushes, until it feels so good he shivers from it, curling one hand against Hannibal’s chest, the other in the sheets. He makes another little noise and tilts his head and looks at Hannibal properly, flushed and warm and delighted in his surprise.

He doesn’t ask if this is how it is meant to feel, he knows Hannibal would stop anything that was not going as it should. He had promised. Will trusts him.

He doesn’t ask.

But he pushes himself just a little closer to kiss against the corner of Hannibal’s mouth, breathless and little, smiling almost too wide to let his lips even meet.

Hannibal seeks out Will’s hand beside him on the bed. He uproots it only enough to slip his own beneath, palm to palm, fingers laced. Squeezing gently, he sighs, he laughs - just a single breath, but a low throaty chuckle all the same - as Will ruts against him, hips curling again and again to stroke their bodies together.

His other hand finds Will’s cheek, his hair, pushing it back from his face and careful not to hold it tight. Their lips meet in a clumsy mashing movement that settles into a give and take, touching, teasing, chasing the other in little leans when their bodies rock together the right way. Hannibal is agonizingly hard now, and still some part of him wants to apologize for the inherent rudeness in such a lack of control, but Will pushes their mouths together again before he can.

Sun spills through Will’s hair, the curls standing up wild between Hannibal’s fingers. Lit to bronze by the light behind it, his cheeks glowing like embers, Hannibal catches only glimpses of him before he is tugged into another furtive kiss.

Will is an unparalleled beauty, and his appearance only compounds his inherent loveliness.

“Slowly,” Hannibal finally breathes, voice rough with disuse, caught against Will’s grinning mouth. “Push harder and rock, oh - Will -”

Will does, listens, adjusts his motions as suggested and makes a sound that immediately embarrasses him. A moan, little and high, breathy and hidden quickly against Hannibal’s skin. But he knows he heard it, he knows he felt it against himself when Will’s voice continued to hum. It feels good, it feels so good.

Will finds a way to turn himself so that he rubs low and long against Hannibal, and pushes back with an arch of his hips. He is inexperienced and lovely, touching and trying and finding what he likes. And discovering - to Will’s great delight and pleasure - what Hannibal likes, what makes him shift and squeeze his hand, what has him turning his hand to draw cool knuckles down Will’s face.

“I didn’t know you could do,” Will sighs, laughing, nuzzling, “nothing at all, just like this, and have it feel so good…”

It does. Oh, it does, and when Hannibal finally loses himself to it enough to slowly roll his hips up against Will in response, it somehow becomes even better. Will is small, but the weight of him spread across Hannibal’s hips is enough that Hannibal can push back against him, a joyful and languid battle between them as they seek a rhythm, Will in his enthusiastic inexperience, Hannibal in his restraint. He wants to turn Will and press down against him, he wants to find that same spot that made Will moan moments before -

No. This is Will’s to claim and Will’s to discover. Enough has been taken from him already for Hannibal to take pleasure, too.

“Simple,” Hannibal whispers. “Easy. Wonderful. Will -”

His boy raises his head, lips damp and parted, flushed rosy from his sweet exertion.

“You are wonderful,” Hannibal tells him, and allows his own voice to purr free when Will rubs harder down against him. He ducks his head to look between them, his own cock tenting his sleep pants, brought to rigid wanting. Will’s pushes out of his shorts, the scarlet tip of it appearing in glistening flashes through the fly of his boxers, and Hannibal squeezes Will’s fingers between his own to hold himself back at the sight of it.

Will is trembling, but it is nothing like the shaking of the night before. He is not scared, he is far from scared. His body is lax and warm and pliant, his hips push forward on their own. He seeks Hannibal’s mouth under his.

“So are you,” Will sighs, blinking up at Hannibal. He sits up for a moment, and continuing to move his hips, Will ducks his head to look between them. His lips part in surprise and confused pleasure - embarrassment and almost wonder. Will swallows and looks up at Hannibal again, shifting against him again, eyes barely open now that he’s so close.

He hopes Hannibal can’t feel how wet he is, leaking from the tip. That would ruin everything.

His eagerness drips, soaking wet spots into his sleep pants, mingling with Hannibal’s own. Will’s little thrusts grow uneven, his thighs tremble clenching around the older man’s hips. He can feel Will nearly vibrating atop him, a rising energy and delight in these new sensations that will surely prove intoxicating to a boy of fourteen who has never known such feelings before.

Hannibal lifts his free hand, stroking Will’s cheek, and asks, “May I touch your chest?”

Will chokes back a small sound, snaring it behind teeth pressed so hard into his bottom lip that he’s made that tender skin scarlet. An unsteady nod gives permission, and Hannibal lets his fingers slip down Will’s neck, across his collarbone ridge, and rest upon his chest. His heart flutters within like a little bird made frantic, and Hannibal purrs, pleased, as he touches his fingertips across a pink nipple and gently squeezes.

The sound Will makes is embarrassing, high and breathless, it arches his back and curls his fingers against Hannibal’s chest. And it was something so small! Something so entirely little and insignificant. Surely Will should not have responded that way? Surely he could -

The heat pools between Will’s legs as his release stains the inside of his boxers, and Will’s blush creeps from his neck down to his chest where Hannibal still teases, gentle strokes and little touches. Will’s hips still shudder in motions against Hannibal’s cock, and Will tries to commit to memory how good it felt to have Hannibal hard for him, enjoying him, before he had humiliated himself.

"I'm sorry," he whispers, bringing up his hands to cover his face, curling almost into a ball atop Hannibal as the mantra continues. "I'm sorry, I'll - it was an accident. You just - it felt so good and - I'm sorry, I -"

Hannibal blinks, distracted by how good Will’s weight feels against him, by the memorization of how pleasure had drawn his face flushed and lax and beautiful. It is only a moment’s hesitation, though, before he brings his arms around Will’s shoulders to hold him close. He stops the movement of his hips, he stops everything but offering nearness to the boy who trembles against him for entirely different reasons now.

“Will,” Hannibal hushes him softly, laying his cheek against Will’s hair. “Sweet boy, no - do not apologize. You did nothing wrong.”

“I made a mess,” Will whispers, breath hitching, into his hands, against Hannibal’s chest.

“Yes,” agrees Hannibal. “An entirely natural one. That is... often the effect of pleasant stimulation. It is normal, and welcome. Brave Will, I wished for you to feel it - to know how good it can feel. It pleases me, it does not anger or disgust me.”

He parts his lips with his tongue, and his brow creases. He has no mind for himself now, but rather for the realization that Will may not understand what happened, or why, or what purpose it serves or why it is not at all wrong, when for Will, it has always been a filthy and unwelcome thing.

He is a doctor, Hannibal reminds himself. He is capable of explaining.

His cheeks darken anyway, despite.

“Do you understand what happened?” Hannibal asks, gently.

"I -" Will wants to say yes, wants to prove his cleverness after this episode, but he doesn’t know, in truth. He has no idea. He had been too little to learn about sex before he had been taken, and his captivity had not been particularly mentally stimulating in that regard.

He knows how that feels against his back, against his thighs and on his face. He knows how revolting it tastes and how long he had to stand under the shower to wash the smell away. He hoped he would never be like that, he would never make such messes and dirty himself and others.

And now Hannibal -

_It pleases me, it does not anger or disgust me._

Will trusts him, he reminds himself. He trusts him.

So after a moment, he swallows and shakes his head.

Hannibal sighs, not in exasperation, but in understanding. Guilt, perhaps, underlies the sound but that is an emotion to which Hannibal has become unfortunately accustomed by now. He strokes Will’s hair again, and brings his hands to Will’s wrists. Gently removing his hands from his face, Hannibal presses his boy’s palms to his mouth instead, and touches a kiss to each.

He begins to explain, in simple but precise terms, clinical but not cold. The biology of it is simple enough - the movement of blood through spongy tissue, the creation of sperm and semen, its fundamental purpose and how it joins to an egg, given opportunity, in acts of procreation. He explains that occasionally, the penis will release these fluids without provocation, and Hannibal feels only mild surprise that Will has not experienced this at night, though it stands to reason that survival takes precedence above all other functions. He explains that procreation is not the only goal or effect, as the act itself is pleasurable enough in pursuit outside those biological constraints.

Hannibal strokes Will’s hair, and rubs his back, as he speaks in low tones. He himself has softened now, with no great discomfort, preoccupied instead with carefully wording his lesson in such a way as to neither offend with unwanted memories or shame Will into shyness. He hopes it suffices, and Hannibal finds this the greatest stress of all.

Will listens, allows the touches to soothe him back to calm, curling up - still dirty - against Hannibal’s chest and stomach. He considers the words, tries to associate them with moments in his life that are applicable and finds very few are.

"So," Will takes a breath, lifts his face a little to watch Hannibal. "My penis will get hard when my body feels good?"

"It is a natural response to pleasant stimuli, yes."

"And I will," Will bites his lip, embarrassed again, and ducks his head, implication clear enough. "When it feels too good?"

“Yes,” Hannibal says, eyes closing as Will tucks his cheek against the older man’s chest. “When stimulated enough, that is usually the result. It is a little messy,” he allows, a smile curving his words, “but that is the worst of it. It is not shameful. It is not inappropriate, so long as you are doing so in private or with someone who wishes to seek that pleasure with you. It is not wrong at all, then.”

Hannibal tucks a finger beneath Will’s chin to tilt his eyes upward again. They search across his face, between his own dark gaze, across the smile that wrinkles his eyes in their corners. Hannibal wonders if Will can see the uneasy pressure that still spreads his ribs too wide between, the curl of tension that winds itself serpentine and poisonous in his stomach.

“You do not need another for this,” Hannibal suggests, gently. “If you do not want someone else, but you wish to feel this way. These feelings are yours, to keep or share, to indulge or ignore, and nobody has right to them but you.”

Will blinks, a semblance of a nod so he doesn't have to move from Hannibal's gentle hold. He imagines, for a moment, touching himself without anyone there, a hand around his cock and his eyes closed. He knows that he would imagine Hannibal, kissing him and touching him with strong hands that have been nothing but gentle with him, always. He knows he would imagine Hannibal's hands stroking where his own would.

Will swallows, thick and quick, and forces himself not to think about this anymore.

He can feel the sticky tackiness between his legs and turns his head into Hannibal’s palm to try and hide his blush, but he's smiling.

"I would think of you, if I was alone," he admits. "I have and... I didn't know I could touch. Should touch. But the thoughts always made me feel good."

Hannibal keeps quiet the sinuous and satisfied sound that stirs inside of him, humming softly instead.

“Then I am flattered,” Hannibal says, entirely genuine, as he tilts a small smile down towards Will. He does not ask what Will thinks of, though a prurient part of him is desperately curious. It is not his business what Will imagines alone, and he will not pry. Perhaps he will imagine the imagining alone, and it will be enough.

More than.

Too much.

“You can think of me, if it pleases you,” he adds. “Or anyone else. Or nothing at all. You can touch if you like, or not. But perhaps, if you mean to be alone, your bedroom is best for those purposes, so I do not disturb you.”

“You wouldn’t,” Will insists with childish certainty. He chews his lip, and his eyes twitch a little narrower, almost devious. “Do you touch?”

Hannibal closes his eyes and releases a long breath through his nose. To say no would be to shame, and a lie, besides. He has, more often than he cares to admit, since the first time that Will demanded so sweetly to be kissed, and Hannibal found himself in thrall to the brave, beautiful, and increasingly spoiled boy in his keeping. Silently, with an arm braced against the shower wall, forcing his breath to steadiness as his hand curved around his cock, thinking only of how soft Will’s lips felt against his own.

“Yes,” Hannibal admits, softly. “From time to time.”

"Did you think of me?" The question was both feared and entirely inevitable, and Will asks it entirely without malice, just a simple childish curiosity to know, to understand, to see if his exploration would be accepted and wanted, or if he should try something else.

The answer comes soft, and Will immediately touches Hannibal's face, just stroking it in reassurance, when Hannibal sighs, "Yes. From time to time."

Will swallows, nuzzles up again and rests on him, contented and warm and pleased by the thought. He chews his lip a moment before parting them with the tip of his tongue.

"I like that you think of me. I'm happy you do. It means I make you feel good."

And no more than that. No prying for details, no worry that he is being seen as those monsters had seen him. Will thinks that in Hannibal’s mind they touch soft and gentle, like they did here, and that thought warms him.

Hannibal’s relief is tangible. He makes it so for Will’s sake. Slowed breaths, patient and serene, rise and fall beneath him. Hannibal would have stopped, had Will reacted with anything less than this gentle pleasure at his confession. In control enough to bring his body between extremes of energy and lack thereof, in control enough to stop his thoughts if Will were alienated by them.

He is glad he needn’t do so, and wonders in quiet awe where Will’s fortitude comes from, his understanding and his compassion. That gentleness was driven from Hannibal by the deeds done to him, and the acts of retribution he did in return. It is the nearest to a miracle that Hannibal has ever witnessed that Will has held his humanity through his ordeal.

“You do more than make me feel good,” Hannibal tells him. “The physical pleasure pales in compare to how much I enjoy your company, with or without touch. I am lucky to know you, and more fortunate still that you honor me with your trust.”

Hannibal sinks his arms around Will and turns him to his side, still pressed close, but now brow to brow.

Will goes, comfortable and held, secure and safe and wanted. He nuzzles and smiles against Hannibal, draws their noses together, kisses him softly on the lips. He can think of no better person to share himself with. He wants no one else.

"I enjoy your company too," Will murmurs, and snuggling close, words buried and muffled against Hannibal’s chest, he adds, "I think I'm falling in love with you."


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Will Graham._
> 
> _Missing._
> 
> _Biloxi, Mississippi._
> 
> _Ten years old._
> 
> _Last seen fixing his crooked glasses with Dumas clutched to his chest, padding on bare feet to a hotel bedroom in Patpong, Thailand._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

It is fortunate that the movements of their lives together afford Hannibal a certain privacy. When he takes time to himself at night, Will only wants to know _how many_. When he brings Will with him, there is only quiet after, but for the rush of water in the shower and the whisper of skin against skin as Hannibal rubs Will’s back until he sleeps. And when Hannibal is away during daylight hours, it is not questioned beyond Will’s quick request to know what Hannibal has brought for him.

He makes sure to have a gift upon his return, always. Sweets or a new book. Brightly colored socks adorned in loud patterns. A kiss on the brow.

As Hannibal watches Will hurtle himself onto the couch and splay across his belly, feet in the air and book beneath his arms, he finds in his mind the recollection of subdural hematomas. In a cranial trauma, though no outward effects are seen, the brain can bruise. It bleeds. Between the organ itself and the _dura mater_ , a flood of ichorous crimson, swelling until such time as the damage is irreparable.

Wounds can be invisible in that way.

It is only a matter of time until their evidence becomes undeniable.

And Will’s blood will be on Hannibal’s hands. It coats them already, slick and viscous, slipping between his fingers. In this Judgement of Solomon, Hannibal sees half a child held by his own selfishness. And still he strokes Will’s hair, in passing. And still he will relent to the clumsy press of petal-soft lips when they seek his out in the dark.

_I think I'm falling in love with you._

Hannibal removes from his pocket a fold of paper and sets it among his things, asking only, “Did you eat today?”

Will makes a sound to suggest he has, but doesn’t elaborate, already engrossed in the _Count of Monte Cristo_ that Hannibal had brought him, a lovely heavy hardcover book. Will devours literature, now, having gotten his speed back up. Once in a while he will even read in Thai for pleasure. He knows it pleases Hannibal, and pleasing Hannibal pleases him.

When Will does look up, fingers holding his page as he lets the book close, he is smiling wide, happy to have Hannibal home again.

“The radio played Rachmaninoff’s entire pianoconcerto number two this morning,” Will tells him. “I can’t remember who they said was performing but it was beautifully played.”

He crosses his ankles and rocks his feet back and forth in the air, toes curling and relaxing, over and over as Will grins at his friend. And he is that, now, Will could not see him as anyone but. More, perhaps, closer and closer friends, but of those he trusts and loves.

Well.

The list starts and ends with Hannibal.

“You look tired,” Will adds softly.

"Do I?" Hannibal asks, and he finds his smile comes easier than it should. Settling to the arm of the couch, he glances to the progress Will has made in his book, twice as far as he was when last Hannibal saw him with it.

Remarkable boy.

Will nods, brows knit and bottom lip held between his teeth. He knows the next question before Hannibal asks it, and so he answers. "I can see it beneath your eyes. A little shadow, but the - the -"

Hannibal lifts a brow.

"Muscles," Will says, stroking a finger beneath his own eye. "They're soft, and in the corners too. Your shoulders slope downward. Are you?"

"Tired? Very," Hannibal tells him. He spreads his fingers, gaze drifting across his pale palm, and only then allows it to rest against Will's head, twining through his hair once more. "Would that I had your swift recovery."

"You could have stayed and slept with me today."

Hannibal tucks a curl of hair behind Will's ear and moves to stand. "Did you sleep?" Hannibal asks, instead. "I hope so. It is a relief you were unharmed last night, but the strain of our efforts requires rest."

Will’s smile is thin but the tension is hardly aimed at Hannibal. Every night they go out - every night Will manages to coax Hannibal into letting him come along - is a strain for him. Too close to home, always bringing back memories he doesn’t need. Yet there is a determination that burns hot in him, every time he takes the hand of one of the children they’re helping, or hoists the smaller ones against his hip when they can’t run anymore.

He is saving them. A hero like Hannibal was to him.

Is to him. Always.

“I slept a little,” he says. “The music helped. A shower helped. And now you’re home, I might sleep some more. And you should too.” Will bites his lip and raises his brows, and the invitation is obvious, if still entirely innocent.

Hannibal glances to the time, the better part of the day behind them now, nearing dinner. He should go again tonight. Complete the twisting side-street from ground to top floors. There is no night, in Hannibal’s estimation, that merits rest when there are those who are unable, who need to be freed from cruelly clutching hands and the monsters that bare their claws.

“Please,” Will asks, and the singular sweetness in the tenor of his voice forces Hannibal to restrain a helpless shudder.

He cannot ask Will to go again. Never two nights in a row; already Hannibal finds himself bringing the boy more than he would ever prefer. It is at Will’s insistence that he does, his formidable skill and drive that gives Hannibal reason to justify it. Daily, there is less that Hannibal can deny him at all.

Daily, Hannibal sees the inevitable approaching swiftly.

And if he cannot fight it himself, as he has shown he cannot, then a more drastic resolution is required.

“Go,” Hannibal tells him. “Bring your book and set the radio as you like. Allow me to settle and I will join you.”

Will’s smile lights up his entire face. “Okay,” he breathes, and scrambling up with the grace of a puppy just learning to use its feet, he drags his book to the bedroom with him. Hannibal watches him go, watches the way he bounces on the balls of his feet, fitter now, faster, healthier in every way. He is growing again, no longer stunted by stress and pain and malnourishment. He will be as tall as Hannibal soon.

Hannibal moves to the kitchen and fills a glass from the tap, setting it aside as Will turns on the radio, and the quiet notes of Vivaldi pour through their shared rooms. It is only then that he moves, taking up the folded paper to study properly by the light of the main balcony window.

He removes a pen, anodized black aircraft-grade aluminum, curved sleek against his palm. One end brought to a sharp point, its weight alone provides a security in rare occasions when Hannibal otherwise ventures to be unarmed. For a moment, a dire amusement narrows his eyes, that he feels he needs it for this.

Marking names on a sheaf of papers.

Seeking through blurred candid pictures for the face he knows now as well as his own.

Wide eyes and laughing smiles, all of them, but for school portraits of forced sobriety. Even then, mischievous, even then unaware of what savagery God or the Fates or mankind’s own innate horrors will visit on them. All missing, still. There is a kind delusion in that none are marked as _presumed dead_.

Five years gone.

Ten.

Thirty.

And still their presences captured in physical descriptions and unchanging images, unaging as years pass as if trapped in amber. Hannibal closes his eyes and tilts his head, stretching out the strain of tension in his neck. He marks off first those boys who would be far older than Will. Those whose characteristics in no way match. Each is a relief and each is a tragedy.

Hannibal is grateful for the dulcet strains of Vivaldi that drown out the quiet sound he makes as his own breath dies in his throat.

_Will Graham._

_Missing._

_Biloxi, Mississippi._

_Ten years old._

Last seen fixing his crooked glasses with Dumas clutched to his chest, padding on bare feet to a hotel bedroom in Patpong, Thailand.

The picture attached shows Will, smaller, face rounder with childhood puppy-fat, hanging upside down from a tree, smile so wide that his eyes are closed with it. His hair is longer, thicker. He was a healthy child. 

He was a happy child.

Hannibal feels bile rise in his throat and presses his forehead to the cool glass, taking even breaths until his body settles. The report is still out, the case is still open. There is no mark against his name to suggest he is dead, gone, forgotten. He is certainly not forgotten.

He’s found. He’s safe.

And Hannibal has to send him home.

He brings the page to his lips and sighs, squeezing every last molecule of breath from his lungs until he is hollow. It is a simple thing, to make right again what Hannibal has done wrong. It is a simple thing to correct this life broken sideways, set it in place like a broken bone and give it space to knit whole again. The execution will be tricky, but Hannibal does not let it staunch the cold relief that slows his heart.

He draws a careful circle around the case number and folds the sheaf once more. It is slipped into the inner pocket of his coat, tactical pen alongside, and Hannibal shrugs it from his shoulders to hang beside the door.

From the little freezer slot within their little fridge, he takes up a pot of coconut ice cream - or what remains of it, anyway. With two spoons, knowing Will is going to insist that Hannibal share, he goes to the bedroom where Will’s bright eyes peek above his book once more, resting against his knees.

“You’re supposed to be asleep,” Hannibal smiles.

Will’s smile just stretches wider, toes wriggling in the blanket before he slides in a bookmark to hold his place and sets the book to the bedside table. He’s on Hannibal’s side of the bed again, as he usually is after they work together, contented to sleep where he can smell Hannibal near, where he can imagine he would rest should he join him.

“I’m up to the dapple grays,” Will says, by means of explanation, and Hannibal just shakes his head in soft amusement. He is so clever now, so quick and alive. Entirely alive. “Plus,” Will adds, shifting to sit on his knees now, hands clasped between them. “You brought ice cream. I can’t sleep through ice cream.”

With a subtle sleight of hand, Hannibal slips one of the spoons into his pants pocket. Feigning doubt, he holds up the ice cream and the single spoon. “I’m afraid I meant it for myself,” Hannibal teases. Will’s grin widens, and Hannibal slides back onto the bed, shoulders against the headboard. He opens the pot and regards Will from the corners of his eyes.

“I could not imagine you would want more,” he muses, twirling the spoon into the desert. “After you’ve had so much already.”

“I ran the entire time when you made me run before,” Will protests, shifting closer in increments, a wriggle there, a turn here, until his knees press to Hannibal’s legs. He watches as Hannibal takes a deliberate spoonful of the dessert and sets it between his lips, humming pleasure as he pulls the spoon free clean. Will laughs and sets one knee over Hannibal’s legs, to straddle him.

“I could always share your spoon,” Will tries, and Hannibal just shakes his head, a smile against his lips despite himself. And with a sigh, Will leans in to kiss him, an unexpected enough thing that Hannibal stills entirely, and Will licks the taste of ice cream from his lips.

“Or I could do that. That works just fine for me,” Will murmurs.

“Greedy boy,” Hannibal smiles, his words cut short when Will leans again to kiss him. Slowly, Hannibal closes their lips together, letting the sweetness linger between them. He allows Will to kiss him. He allows it for as long as his heart can stand, the weak and faltering thing, insolent and irrational.

“Take the spoon,” he tells Will, waiting until slight fingers slip the utensil from his own, before he removes the other from his pocket. Will laughs summer sun across Hannibal’s cheek, as the older man leans back to regard him at whatever distance he can manage.

“Can you teach me that?” Will asks, inching higher up Hannibal’s thighs as he digs his spoon in.

“So that you might pilfer more sweets from me?” Hannibal teases. “Perhaps.”

Will’s smile is contagious. He smiles so much now, enough that his cheeks dimple and his eyes narrow, enough that he looks like the boy in the photo Hannibal had found. Again, Hannibal’s heart squeezes tight, his breath holds, and he watches Will dig a spoonful of ice cream carefully from the container and immediately offer it to Hannibal first.

Always him first. Always others first. Will has remained, somehow, despite everything and every cruelty, a giving soul. A caring boy, entirely open to love and affection, able to not only give it but accept it, seek it. He is extraordinary.

Hannibal leans forward to take the offering and Will parts his lips in sympathy.

He is beautiful.

And he is not his.

“When we finish this, you will sleep.”

“Only if you do,” Will teases back, and takes the next spoonful for himself.

Hannibal need not lift his spoon again. Not when every other bite is offered to him with insistence and a tangible pleasure. Not with Will, who looks after Hannibal as much as Hannibal looks after him. It is difficult to reconcile this bright and charming boy with who he becomes at night - weakening himself in posture and voice, bolstering swift and skilled when they need to move. He is not fearless. Fear lives in them both. But it controls neither.

Hannibal wonders what he will do when gentle arms around his neck and a tired murmur asking to be carried to bed are no longer his incentive beyond the work itself.

“You have to answer,” Will grins, and Hannibal blinks upward, lifting a hand to straighten Will’s glasses.

“When I sleep, will you clamber across me, all knees and elbows?”

Will snorts a little laugh, scraping the bottom of the pot. “Maybe.”

“Good,” Hannibal says. “I’m afraid I’ve become accustomed to it. How else might I find rest if not for your snoring against my chest?”

Will makes an indignant sound and holds the spoon between his lips. When he removes it, it is to set his spoon, and Hannibal’s, into the empty pot and onto the bedside table.

“I don’t snore.”

“Oh, you do.”

“Maybe you snore and you blame it on me,” Will argues. Hannibal just shakes his head sagely, watching Will’s cheeks pinkening with embarrassment and pleasure.

“You snore like the characters in those cartoons you watch sometimes,” Hannibal says, taking a breath to imitate a ridiculous sound that has Will in peals of laughter before he leans in to try and kiss Hannibal to silence again. He finds himself snared, Hannibal’s fingers seeking the spots at Will’s sides that tickle, that have him shrieking giggles and squirming to get away.

“Stop, stop! Mercy! Aah!” Will wriggles free enough to fall back onto the bed, and Hannibal follows, only enough to rest on his side, he never presses atop Will, never holds him down. He can reach well enough, and only relents when Will’s pleading turns breathless and his cheeks flushed red.

“Sleep,” Hannibal tells him, smiling, and Will squirms happily in bed, lip between his teeth.

“Okay,” he sighs.

This in itself is a wonder, that Will closes his eyes and settles, that he sleeps at all. Hannibal remembers all too well the night-terrors and the tightening of sheets as Will clenched them in his fists. He remembers the tears that would come after an accident, the fearful apologies that followed. He will not forget those things, any more than he will forget how brave Will is in facing his own monsters, nor how strong he has grown in spite of them. It is the darkest memories that will drive Hannibal onward, against knives and conspiracies, into the shadowed recesses lit only by blinding neon, here and anywhere that he might let another like Will learn to sleep again.

Beautiful, brave boy.

“Will you show me?” Will asks, seeking closer to Hannibal with little kitten nuzzles against his shirt. “How you hid the spoon.”

“A simple trick,” Hannibal says. He threads his fingers through Will’s hair, twining into silken curls. “I will teach you tomorrow.”

He will teach him everything he can in what days remain for them. He’ll instill in Will whatever he possibly can that might be of use to him, to protect himself when Hannibal no longer is there to do so. The thought threatens to tighten his fingers but Hannibal forces them to ease.

It is a safer life he sends Will to than any Hannibal could hope to provide.

Better Hannibal the collateral damage than a boy who should be laughing from trees.


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“How do you feel,” Hannibal says, setting Will’s glass down and taking his seat across from him, “about surprise endings?”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

John Graham no longer lives in Mississippi.

Soon after Will was taken, in fact, he moved to Greenville, and again two years later to Buffalo. Following the waterways, from dock to dock where his work was needed, Hannibal assumes. He is relieved to see the man’s name attached now to a small shop, wherein he works on lake boats. Stable, then. Consistent. A picture on his single-page website reveals a graying man with a dog at his side, forcing a smile past wrinkles carved with weather and work.

Hannibal wonders too how much of the age he shows came on too quickly, three years before.

The concept of a lone wolf is a myth. Those that have been driven from their pack have been exiled for illness or malignancy; few healthy predators operate entirely alone. Hannibal is no exception, and though reaching out is a rarity, he is glad for those who yet know him.

And he can’t imagine a time when he would not be glad to hear her voice.

“Dr. Bloom,” Hannibal says, closing his tablet to instead shield his phone from the sounds of the busy riverside. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”

“Hannibal!” 

He can hear the smile in her voice. Alana always smiles, at least, always did when Hannibal had known her. She was one of his best students, if not the brightest, and one of the only he had remained in touch with as she proceeded to carve a name for herself in her field, well-chosen. “It’s been too long, I had worried you decided to forget about staying in touch altogether.”

“I’ve found my time occupied of late. I’ve been neglectful.”

“Truly you have,” Alana snorts gently. “Enjoying your sabbatical like any normal person should. You must be ill.”

“Still working, I assure you,” he says, and she laughs again, luminous.

“I never doubted it. You’re well then?”

“Enough. And the practice?”

“Exhausting,” she says, but with a warmth that eases the strain from Hannibal’s chest. “And wonderful, when there’s progress. It’s slow, painfully slow, but when there’s a break-through you forget everything else before it.”

“Children are astounding in their resiliency,” he agrees. As if he had not already thought highly of her during her mentorship with him, the stack of offers laid across his desk confirmed to him the truth of her nature. Prestigious institutions, renowned hospitals, all passed over in favor of working with adolescents.

It’s nearly enough to renew one’s faith in Fate, that they find themselves here.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” she asks. “Or is this business?”

“The latter, I’m afraid, albeit of a personal nature. Are you free to speak openly?”

There is the sound of shifting, and Alana sighs against the phone as she settles. “Of course.” It is evening, now, Hannibal had calculated well enough to call so as not to disturb her between clients and her own personal time. She always stays late in the office, she picked up the habit from Hannibal early. “How can I help?”

Hannibal considers his answer. What could he say, truthfully, without drawing Alana into his dangerous world here? What could he tell her without arousing suspicion as to what he is doing in Thailand? He thinks of Will, still asleep when Hannibal had left, his usual note perched on top of Will’s book for when he wakes up and seeks for Hannibal beside him. He thinks of the laughing child in the photograph from three years before.

“I have few clients here, but one in particular has caught my concern more than others,” Hannibal begins. “A young boy who is due to return home to America soon. I wonder if you would have an opening for him?”

“For a new patient?” Alana asks, humming quietly as she holds the phone against her shoulder. “Certain days might be easier than others. For you I’d take on anyone, you know that. What is his history?”

Hannibal rubs the bridge of his nose, but finds it does little to relieve the pressure behind his eyes. With a deep breath, he sits forward, and finds the adequate tenor of his voice for clinical facts, in hopes it masks the turmoil roiling thick in his throat.

“He was given over to my care via the embassy, when no immediate family could be located within the country. While held in captivity, he suffered extensive physical and sexual trauma, prolonged over a period of roughly three years. Post-traumatic stress disorder,” he lists. “Hypervigilance. Intrusive thoughts and disrupted sleep patterns. Acting-out of learned behaviors. Occasions of dissociation and depression. Relatively few moments of anhedonia at this stage, thankfully, nor does he show any acute learned helplessness. The opposite, in fact.”

Alana sighs hard against the mouthpiece, lips parting with a stunned click. “Children are astounding in their resiliency,” she says.

“What enduring personality changes have taken root are unclear,” Hannibal says. “I imagine as work with his family begins, this may become more apparent.”

“Christ.”

What else is there to say? That Will is a wonder, despite everything that has been done to him. That he is a funny, precocious boy with a taste for adventure novels and an alarming sweet-tooth. That he makes little sounds when he sleeps at night, no longer of fear, but as a prelude to the press of lips against Hannibal’s cheek.

“He is a very brave boy,” Hannibal says.

Alana hums agreement and Hannibal lets the silence rest between them for a moment more. He wishes he could say the things unsaid, he wishes he could come with Will and bring him home safe, and then stay. He wishes. 

In another lifetime, perhaps.

“Has there been any success in tracking down his family?” Alana asks after a while, and Hannibal knows that she is taking notes, silent on her tablet with a stylus, watching her handwriting - though immaculate - transfer to typed print almost immediately.

“For a long time we had no last name to go from,” Hannibal admits. “He was found through a process of elimination in the end, with the information he had been able to remember. We found his father. I would like to ask if you could see him, before he gets the official call.”

“Of course.”

Hannibal swallows and keeps his eyes on his shoes, polished and impeccably kept. At Alana’s prompting, Hannibal recites John Graham’s address and contact number. He does not need to tell Alana how crucial it will be to break the news of his son’s safety in a way he can take. Alana’s work involves visits to troubled families, consolation and empathy, a specific touch in soothing painful memories.

“I am loathe to infringe on your generosity more than I have already -”

“Infringe,” she tells him, and Hannibal smiles a little.

“Due to the nature of his time here, it is both paramount to return him to safety, and to do so with sensitivity,” Hannibal says. “If you have a contact here, at the embassy perhaps -”

“Why not the one who sent him to you?”

“It was a perfunctory act,” he says, his words well-rehearsed after sleepless nights straightening his story. “And I fear that those we cannot vouch for personally may be compromised. There is corruption in all corners, even those very tidy ones.”

Hannibal listens to the clicking of Alana’s stylus, pensive.

“I can find someone,” she says. “I will, through the State Department. Can you email me the information you have?”

“Of course.”

“You’ll have to meet them.”

“Of course.”

It is worth his own compromise to do so. He would not send Will alone, sending him off with a handful of papers and instructions. No. Whatever promises exist between them - spoken or unspoken - remain, and Hannibal will gladly suffer whatever fallout comes of it to be there when Will goes.

Soon.

It must be soon.

He cannot prolong this any longer, for either of them.

“Send it,” she says, with a clap of her stylus. “I’ll let you know when and where, and I’ll be there when he arrives. A few days, at most, for me to reach out to his father and make arrangements.”

“Alana,” Hannibal interrupts, gently. She makes a questioning sound, and he says only, “Thank you.”

\---

“How much more is there to go?”

Will’s swinging feet slow as he looks up from his book. Pushing his glasses back up his nose, he fans through the last handful of pages and chews his lip. “Not long.”

“Another book, then, besides,” Hannibal suggests, turning back to the curry boiling thick to ladle it over rice. “I fear that it is a longer trip this time. I would not want you to be bored.”

Will grins and ducks his head to keep reading, or appear to - his eyes don’t move across the page. Hannibal had told him they would both go, this time, just out of Patpong. A trip for them, before they return. Will had tried to hide the joy near exploding in his chest at the thought. It was far enough away that they would have to take several hours to get there. A real trip. Together.

“I like the books you choose,” Will says finally, tapping his finger against the page before him. “You always choose ones that take a long time to get into, ones that need patience.” He doesn’t say that it is a novelty to have that in his life, with Hannibal. No rush for anything. No pressure to get anywhere. Like the pages of the novels he reads, slow and steady, things happening and characters weathering them in their own way and by their own strength.

“And you have that,” Hannibal tells him. “Not only for novels, but for many things. My suggestions would be very poor for anyone unwilling to see the story through to the end. It is worth it, though, is it not?”

Will closes his book around the little bookmark he picked during one of their outings, cartoon dogs facing every which way. He slides it aside as Hannibal brings his bowl to him, waiting with folded fingers as Hannibal sets his own aside and returns to the kitchen.

“Always,” Will decides.

Hannibal’s fingers still against the glasses, only a brief pause, before he sets them down to fill - his own with water, and Will’s with milk.

“I will see if I can find one to last you, then, from the ones we have here,” Hannibal says. “I hope it does. You are voracious.”

A snorting laugh from the table sinks Hannibal’s heart into his belly. He will force himself to eat, though he wants none of it. He will force himself to smile as he turns back, gentling the muscles around his eyes, entirely too aware that Will can read his expressions with alarming clarity.

“How do you feel,” Hannibal says, setting Will’s glass down and taking his seat across from him, “about surprise endings?” Little feet shove into his lap and Hannibal drops a hand to rub one, through soft socks checkered in lime green and bright orange. “Say we were to go for more than a train ride. A night, or several, away from Patpong.”

Will’s grin is blinding, and he wriggles in his seat before taking up his fork to start on his dinner. Chicken again, this evening, and spicier than what Hannibal initially made them, at the beginning - Will seems to have quite a taste for spice and chili. “Where would we go?”

“Surprise endings,” Hannibal reminds him, and the boy squirms happily as he resists asking again. For a while, they eat quietly, Will still able to only take small portions but now less guilty when he leaves food on his plate, less concerned about eating the leftovers the next day. He knows Hannibal will not be angry.

When he looks up again, bright blue eyes over the rims of his glasses, Hannibal sighs a laugh, amused.

“You will ruin it, Will.”

“Can you tell me how if you don’t tell me where?” Will asks, chewing lightly on his fork as Hannibal considers him.

Setting his own utensil down, Hannibal leans back in his chair, eyes narrowed in a smile as he regards his boy. He settles his hands to Will’s feet again, rubbing gently, as he does after they’ve finished a run, or an arduous session of _eskrima_. Firm thumbs work up the center of his feet, never tickling.

Every dinner for months they have shared just so.

Every breakfast.

Hannibal wonders if he will feel the pressure of Will’s toes against his belly in his absence, touches and laughter, shadows of movement like phantom limbs, their hosts amputated.

“A boat,” he says, smile widening as Will’s eyes grow round. “Like Dantès, fleeing the Château d'If.”

Will makes a sound, little and excited, and presses his feet firmer against Hannibal’s hands.

“I love boats,” he breathes, and Hannibal just smiles at him. True to his word, Will does not ask for more, he digs into his dinner with new fervor, stopping only to drink his milk and continue on. He finishes everything in his bowl, and when released from the table, goes immediately to brush his teeth before bed.

His excitement is palpable, Will is nearly bouncing off the walls with the knowledge that they will be going somewhere together, the very next afternoon, and on a _boat_! Hannibal is glad that he will remember Will this way, on their last full day together, on his last night in the hotel suite with Hannibal. Happy and young and alive.

His beautiful Will.

“Do you know how to sail?” Will asks, toothbrush in his mouth as he leans out from the bedroom door and watches Hannibal do the dishes.

Hannibal looks across his shoulder, at the spill of foam past Will’s lips, messy and fearless in being so. His hand tightens against the ceramic bowl in his hand, and he shakes his head, brows uplifted.

“I do not,” he admits. “I fear you think too highly of me. There are many things I do not know.”

Why he has waited so long, and let them both fall so far.

What will come of them now, a world apart.

Whether Will shall someday look back on this with spite, and feel as used in Hannibal’s affections as he does by all the others who have hurt him.

Will returns to the bathroom and spits, loudly, and rinses as Hannibal shuts off the sink and sets the last dish aside. He cannot stay here. He will not come back. Any remaining items will be discarded, and more’s the better. He takes up a towel to dry his hands and freezes, as slim arms snare around his middle, and Will breathes warmth between his shoulder blades.

“No sweets,” Hannibal murmurs. “You will hardly sleep at all as it is.”

“Don’t want any,” Will mumbles, nuzzling against Hannibal and holding him close. Hannibal wonders if he knows, like an animal sensing vibrations in the air before an earthquake, that something is going to change. That something huge is about to happen.

Why did he allow this for so long?

Why did Hannibal not drag the filthy, skinny little thing to the embassy right when he had found him?

“Just wanna sleep with you,” Will sighs, squeezing Hannibal’s middle just once more before slinking around him to hug him from the front, chin against Hannibal’s chest as he watches him with hooded eyes and a sleepy smile. A warm and heavy boy, where once he had been a little scarecrow of a thing. Will leans forward and Hannibal takes one step back to keep them balanced.

“I cannot deny you.”

But he can, and he will.

“Come.”

Hannibal bends just a little - Will has grown so tall already, nearing fifteen - and hoists Will against him. Long legs curl around his waist and slender arms around his neck and Hannibal carries him as if he were weightless. The lights are shut off one by one as they go, together, but for the last in the bedroom, always the last.

“You must pack in the morning,” Hannibal tells Will, setting him to the edge of the bed. Before he can squirm beneath the sheets, Hannibal stops him. Large hands frame his cheeks, one lifting to stroke fondly across his hair. “It may be some time before we return,” he says, smiling. “Bring all that you need. One should not go aboard a ship ill-prepared.”

Will smiles, turns his face into the hands that frame it and he nods. In the morning he will pack a change of clothes, his books, another pair of glasses, just in case. He wonders if he could ask Hannibal if they could stay forever, on a boat somewhere far away from here. He wonders and he knows all at once. No. No they cannot. They are heroes. Heroes don’t take vacation.

They will return and they will save lives.

“I will,” Will says.

“I will give you your book tomorrow,” Hannibal tells him, and Will’s face lights up even more at the thought. He presses a kiss to Hannibal’s palm and slithers back over the sheets to crawl under them, watching Hannibal from beneath the covers as he changes into his sleep pants and climbs into bed as well. 

Will no longer hesitates in pressing close against him, pressing his lips to the stubbled warm skin of Hannibal’s jaw as his eyes close on a sigh.

“Thank you,” Will tells him.

Hannibal holds his hand suspended for an instant above Will’s head before lowering it. Stroking gently through his wild hair, he turns towards Will and lays facing him. Burying his nose in fluffy, soap-scented curls, Hannibal breathes him in. He commits to his memory the blossoming of spring’s first flowers, bursting vibrant through a crust of ice. He commits to his memory the sinful sweetness of honey, untouched by human hands.

He memorizes the particular scents of Will Graham, in that moment, and the sound of his slowing breath as he eases to sleep.


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Hannibal could spend a lifetime watching him. Just so, idle and relaxed, free of any burdens but the quickness of the landscape moving too fast for him to absorb every leaf and blade of grass and birdsong. There will be time for him, time to see the beauty of the world beyond the ugliness that defined his existence. He will delight in discovery as he does now; he will breathe and he will grow._
> 
> _And that knowledge must be consolation enough._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

Will’s feet cross behind him as he kneels on the plush chair and presses his face to the window. Beyond, the landscape speeds by, too quick to see, and Will lets his eyes go unfocused to just experience the color instead. He wishes he could paint, because this is what excitement looks like.

Behind him - or beside, if he sat in his seat as he should - Hannibal watches him, a book wrapped in brown paper with a rough rope ribbon in his hands. Will had asked to have the book on the boat only, so he could experience two wonderful things at once. He hadn’t asked about the title, and Hannibal hadn’t offered.

On the floor sits Will’s duffel, and in it all his worldly possessions. Books and shoes and clothes, socks folded into each other, one of Hannibal’s ties snuck in when Will thought the man wasn’t looking, but Hannibal knows. When Will turns to look at Hannibal, it is with a grin bright as the sun.

“You still won’t tell me where we’re going?” he asks.

Will does not lean toward Hannibal, hands on his legs or shoulders, drifting as if by gravitational pull into the man’s lap. He does not coax from him the truth with kisses that flutter soft as moth wings over Hannibal’s lips and cheeks. Both know they cannot, when they are in public this way. They are family, to any attention that would find its way to them.

They are anyway, Hannibal supposes, at least for now.

“Correct,” Hannibal says. “I still will not.”

He rests his head back against the seat and returns Will’s grin with a smile of his own.

“Will I know when we get there?”

“I should hope so. And I hope that it will please you.”

In time. With work. Without him.

Will smiles, contented, and turns back to the window, sitting back on his heels as he sets his shoulder to the back of his chair and watches the world go by. He has never felt trapped with Hannibal, never felt confined to the hotel room, he had always just felt comfortable there. It was home. It is home. But going out, like this, together - this is a treat that Will had not expected and is entirely delighted by.

A boat! With _Hannibal_!

He thinks of how nice it will be, after the boat ride, to find a place to stay, to go out for dinner together, pretending still to be father and son, and then come back to their room and their bed and -

Will bites his lip and grins, watching his reflection in the window, lifting his eyes to see Hannibal’s blurred behind him. Tonight he wants to sleep with him. Properly. Not because Hannibal is making him, not because Will feels indebted, but because the very thought makes Will’s heart flutter in his throat, makes his fingers tremble and his thighs squeeze together in a squirm.

Because he wants to.

A surprise for Hannibal that he hopes Hannibal will like as Will loves this one already.

“Will you dizzy yourself with the countryside the entire time?” Hannibal asks, voice warm with amusement. They have the car to themselves, a private space but for the occasional beat of footsteps of another passenger walking by. Will’s hands leave prints on the window as he presses closer to watch a water buffalo whizz by outside.

“Yes.”

Hannibal hums, and hooking a finger into the waistband of Will’s shorts, drags him back to his bottom.

“You will make yourself sea-sick before we ever reach the sea.”

“I won’t be,” laughs Will, tilting his head back to watch Hannibal upside down. Hannibal would kiss him, now, every insolent beat of his heart demanding it with a martial rhythm. Will’s lips part as if that drumming is audible to him, in turn, and Hannibal merely smiles.

“Show me how you will treat it, if it happens.”

Will twists to his knees again, facing Hannibal this time. Cheeks pink, glasses perched precariously on the end of his nose, he works his fingers against the inside of his wrist. “Here,” Will says, before pinching the space between his thumb and forefinger. “And here.”

With a glance to the door, Hannibal holds his breath. There is no one. There is no one.

There is Will.

He leans to brush a kiss across his brow.

No more.

“Count the buffalo then,” Hannibal says, gentle. “Enjoy the countryside while we have it.”

Will looks at him a moment, shifts to settle on his butt properly and rests his head against the back of his chair to watch Hannibal instead. He narrows his eyes, watches Hannibal narrow his in turn. He makes a face, watches Hannibal fight a smile and contort his lips the same way. Will wrinkles his nose, giggles when Hannibal does the same and growls low in his throat.

Will sighs and watches him quietly then, lets his eyes travel over the man he loves so much, the man who saved him and continues to save others every day. Then, without a word, Will wriggles around to look out the window again, one leg curled beneath him, the other dangling to the floor, swinging lightly back and forth, occasionally kicking his bag.

Hannibal could spend a lifetime watching him. Just so, idle and relaxed, free of any burdens but the quickness of the landscape moving too fast for him to absorb every leaf and blade of grass and birdsong. There will be time for him, time to see the beauty of the world beyond the ugliness that defined his existence. He will delight in discovery as he does now; he will breathe and he will grow.

And that knowledge must be consolation enough.

Will drags his leg out from beneath himself, and Hannibal lifts an arm as Will begins to lean. He brings his feet up to the seat and lays with his head on Hannibal’s thigh, eyes on the wide blue sky. His lower lip finds its way between his teeth, and Hannibal pretends not to notice the blush burning warmth beneath his eyes.

“Shall I read to you?” Hannibal offers, twisting a finger through one dark curl. He tugs it straight and releases it. “That way you will know how this story ends, before you begin the next.”

Will grins and nods, reaching for his bag to drag free his copy of Dumas' classic, careful to hold it closed until he gives it to Hannibal. There is one chapter left, and as Will settles against Hannibal’s lap again, Hannibal begins to read. His voice is low, warm, his accent adjusting to fit each character and to set the final scene. He reads until he hears the familiar soft snoring from Will against him, lips parted lax and one hand hanging over the edge of the seat.

Hannibal watches him, sweet, brave Will, and allows himself to stroke a hand down Will’s arm, back up to his shoulder and elegant neck. Carefully, he removes Will’s glasses before they can fall and sets them, folded, in his pocket. He holds the book in his hands and considers it, some pages folded to hold spots of favorite passages or quotes, others oddly angled.

When Hannibal gently picks against one, he finds that it is not a page in the book at all, but a note, one of his own, to Will.

Hannibal returns the note and seeks another. More and more, almost every chapter holding at least two, some in Thai, others in English, one in French for his boy. Little assurances that he will return, noting the time he left. Reminders that there is dinner waiting for him, and to not forget to eat. A cartoon cat from a chocolate wrapper, torn in an uneven circle. A ticket stub from the pinball arcade. Coaxings to study his Thai, written in Thai, with the promise that perhaps there will be a reward if he does so.

There was always a reward. The continuance of Will's existence is achievement enough.

The constant rhythm of their ebb and flow captured in scraps of paper whose absence in the bin went unnoticed by Hannibal. A library of their life lived together.

And one more, unread, tucked within the pages of the book wrapped at Hannibal’s side. Unlike the others, it makes no promise, but instead asks forgiveness.

He lifts Will’s hand from where it grazes the floor and brings Will’s fingers to his mouth. Tucking a gentle kiss to his fingertips, he lays Will’s arm to rest across his stomach and keeps his own hand atop. Hannibal does not sleep. He could not, would not yield a moment of seeing Will at peace this way. There are few enough to spare as the hours grow long and night falls across Thailand.

Hannibal smells the sea before he sees it. Salt-air stings crisp as he draws a deep breath, bracing Will to stop him sliding from the seat as the train begins to clatter to a stop. It takes but one off-beat of the wheels for his boy to awaken with a drowsy blink that grows in its aperture immediately.

“Please forgive me,” Hannibal tells him, framing Will’s cheek with his hand. He strokes his thumb against Will’s freckled cheek as the boy’s brows lift in question. “I am afraid I lost count of your _jao-tooy_.”

Will’s smile spreads wide, a slow and sleepy thing, and he brings the back of his hand up to rub his eyes, arching his back in a deliberate stretch that leaves him entirely pliant in his seat after.

"S'okay," he mumbles. "We can count them on the way home."

He remains against Hannibal for a moment more before letting his feet touch the ground and standing to stretch properly, hands above his head, up on his toes until his bones softly click and align, until he is himself again. He leaves Hannibal to go to the bathroom and the older man just waits, hands in his lap still holding the book he has wrapped for Will.

He will be looked after.

He will be fed.

He will be protected.

He will be safe and he will be loved.

A mantra, again and again, looping like feedback through Hannibal’s thoughts into a din of white noise. Hannibal stands slowly, legs warm with the memory of Will resting against him, and he takes up Will’s bag and his own, packed lightly with the necessities he needs to reach wherever the wind moves him next. It will be unsafe to return to Patpong after making contact with the embassy; it has been increasingly unsafe despite that. He is known, now, in rumors and whispers, and so it’s only a matter of time until he becomes hunted, rather than hunter.

It is a worthy reason to convince himself to leave, when in truth he isn’t sure he could return to their little home and remain at all intact there alone.

Soft fingers pull Hannibal’s attention back from the darkness outside the window, as Will takes his duffle to carry himself. Will’s curiosity rests for a moment on the smile Hannibal offers, a flicker of tension drawing his brows briefly inward.

“Shall we go and find the boat, then?” Hannibal asks.

Will nods, quick and delighted, and grasps Hannibal’s hand for just a moment before walking past him and off the train.

Outside, the heat is palpable but bearable with evening fallen. Proximity to the water lends relief from the humidity as well, and Hannibal watches Will take in the new surroundings with bright-eyed curiosity. He is exceptional. Always learning, always feeling, open to experiences when he could so easily have been broken of his childish wonder.

But Will is too strong for that. Hannibal reminds himself as he follows his boy that he will recover, he will grow stronger with people he loves, with support and care where he belongs.

How desperately Hannibal will miss him.

"If you give me the book before we get on the boat I can read it to you like you read to me," Will tells him, falling into stride beside Hannibal and pressing his shoulder against him until Hannibal lifts his arm and holds him close. They garner few looks, out of place but not untoward. Hannibal does not let him go. Not yet.

But he does give Will the book, wrapped neatly, holding it a moment more as Will takes it with both hands.

“Only on the condition that you not skip ahead,” Hannibal tells him, smile spread warm to the corners of his eyes. “The ending would make little sense, known now, than if the entire story were experienced first in its own time.”

Will just smiles, deliberately takes the book to hold in front of him before carefully working the string undone as they walk. He pockets it. Next, the paper, never ripped, always carefully worked free and folded after. Within is a book in soft cover, in almost a suede finish with the title glossy on top.

_Captain Corelli's Mandolin_

Will grins, turning the book over to read the blurb as they are bustled along by other people seeking the boat. It is more than just transport; seeing the sun rise over the ocean is a breathtaking thing, and an amusing and unusual tourist attraction. Hannibal thinks of how they could just do that, together. Read and nap on the boat, watch the sun rise, get off on the other shore and find a hotel room.

They could.

The ache snares Hannibal hard enough that for a moment he stops breathing.

_They could._

Will makes a sound beside him, and Hannibal knows he has seen the boat. And knows, immediately, that he cannot get on it with him.

“It’s huge!” Will declares, cradling the book beneath his arm as he darts forward, sneakers kicking up dust. He stops only a few steps away, glancing back to Hannibal with a grin.

There.

Just there.

Smiling so hard he’s near to laughter, squinting from behind his glasses against the ocean’s breeze. Freckled cheeks, tan from Thailand’s sun, rosy with excitement. His hair tousled wild in the wind, a halo of golden-brown from the dawning sun behind him. A book under his arm, standing so tall and so strong with the weight of his bag held easily on his shoulder.

This is how Hannibal will remember him, preserving him in the amber of memory and with the knowledge that beyond it, he will be looked after.

He will be fed.

He will be protected.

He will be safe and he will be loved.

“You did not expect a sailboat, I hope,” Hannibal says, catching up only for Will to dart ahead again, and wait, scarcely able to stop himself from running to the ship at full-bore. “There must be room enough on board for all the ice cream you will require, space to sprawl yourself as you read. All your books -”

“I only have two,” laughs Will.

“For now,” Hannibal says, squinting as he teases. Beside the gangplank is a woman who Hannibal knows only from the pictures Alana has sent him, black sleek hair and sharp eyes, but a smile now as she sees them approach.

She holds eye contact for long enough for Hannibal to nod, and turns away, a passenger just like everyone else. Hannibal's hands flex, again and again and as he passes their tickets over, he gently steers Will aside with a smile, holding his hand out for Will’s bag, handing him the tickets in return.

"The train took a little longer than I thought. Go watch the sunrise, I'll take our bags to the room and come right back."

"You promise?" Will asks, still grinning and wild with joy, fully awake now in his excitement, and Hannibal realizes he cannot lie to him. He cannot have the last thing he says to Will be remembered as an untruth. Instead he leans in and presses their foreheads together, seeking forgiveness, granting a silent goodbye all at once.

He swallows.

"Go," he says softly, watching Will bounce away with his book under his arm still. He hopes that Will will turn back, just once, but he never does, too overwhelmed with excitement to see the sun rise gold and blood orange over the calm water.

Hannibal has his memories. He has his boy safe in his mind.

He hands Will’s bag off to one of the attendants, quoting the room number and handing him a tip. By the window Will has chosen, he sees the woman approach his boy and say something that has Will turning to her with a smile. He holds up his book and she nods, and Will gestures happily, to the cover, to the window.

Hannibal hopes he is remembered so fondly, if he is remembered at all.

He hears the final call for boarding, steps out of sight as Will turns to look for him, and turns away again when he is satisfied with the knowledge that Hannibal is in their room. That he will come back up and share the sunrise with him.

As the last passengers hurry aboard, Hannibal silently steps off the boat and makes his way to shore. He cannot see Will from where he stands, to prevent himself being seen, but he imagines him. Biting his lip in a grin, adjusting his glasses. Turning eagerly as the ship begins to pull from the shore to seek out the kind woman who made her introduction to him, and then their room.

Then Hannibal.

Then -

A breath shudders curt from Hannibal, a sound of animal pain chipped loose before he can stop it. As the gangplank withdraws, a wild panic snares him, stopped only by the tightening of every muscle Hannibal can find. He could still run. He could drop his bag and pound swift across sand and sea, pull himself up by brute force and then aboard. He could snare Will up into his arms before the first realization of what nearly took place darkens his eyes and he could hold him against his chest until their hearts settle and never let him go, not ever.

There is time.

There is an instant.

And there is not.

The metal gate ratchets shut and the ship’s horn blows as the sea spreads before it, ruffling into waves against Hannibal’s feet and over them. He was close, had he not stopped himself, racing before he could realize he’d moved at all, against time and reason. Hannibal lets his bag slip from his shoulders, as his body drops to the shore beside it.

He times his breath to the movement of waves, and tries, failing, to wipe the salt from his cheeks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are chapters more to go. Trust us. <3


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Every time, she walks him through a list of emotions, calmly spoken, to help him express what he can’t form into words. The first time she offers him_ angry _, he nods. Anger fills his stomach enough that he can’t fit food into it. Anger pulls him jerking from sleep when his body grows heavy. Anger steals his voice. And anger scrapes his shoulder against walls when the open spaces of his house - not his home - feel too big._
> 
> _Never towards his father. Never towards Dr. Bloom._
> 
> _Towards himself, she asks, and he nods._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

_His father says he isn't eating._

Will sees Alana twice a week, and every session he sits curled up in the little armchair and rereads _Captain Corelli's Mandolin_. He has not spoken a word since his father had picked him up from the airport, a brief breaking of every wall he had so meticulously built, to hug his dad and mumble in sobbing patois how he is sorry, he is so sorry.

He thinks he lost consciousness but he can’t remember.

He knows he woke up at home with Winston at his side, Maggie at the foot of his bed, and his dad asleep in a soft, worn chair beside it. He knows he can’t find any words, so he hadn't bothered since.

Every time, she walks him through a list of emotions, calmly spoken, to help him express what he can’t form into words. The first time she offers him _angry_ , he nods. Anger fills his stomach enough that he can’t fit food into it. Anger pulls him jerking from sleep when his body grows heavy. Anger steals his voice. And anger scrapes his shoulder against walls when the open spaces of his house - not his home - feel too big.

Never towards his father. Never towards Dr. Bloom.

Towards himself, she asks, and he nods.

She doesn’t ask if he feels it towards Hannibal, but he would nod then, too, if she did.

Slowly, Will begins to resume a healthy diet. Fish and roasted vegetables, dessert offered but he doesn’t take it. Not yet. He makes the effort to sit with his father and watch television in the evenings, Winston at his side and Maggie at his feet. He looks at him when John speaks. Will just doesn't say anything back.

At Alana's recommendation, Will takes lessons at home, covering the subjects he missed in school. Will takes to education quickly. It takes only a few months for him to catch up to his age group in mathematics, and in reading he is well ahead. When his father suggests that perhaps he would like to start high school the next year, Will nods emphatically. 

He still doesn't say anything.

Will runs every morning, as far as he can before his breath leaves him and he stumbles back against the sidewalk to sit down and catch it again. Sometimes he kicks the curb, sometimes he sobs, curled in on himself. He wonders why Hannibal hates him. He wonders what he did wrong. He wonders why Hannibal didn't come with him, here.

When Alana offers the word _love_ , Will feels like he can't breathe. He gives back anger. He throws the box of tissues, throws his book, and immediately stands to clean up the mess. He draws in on himself and wails softly against his knees in the chair and Alana calls the session short.

_He engages with greater frequency, and though he doesn’t voice his emotions, he expresses them. Recently, he’s started spending weekends helping John in the shop, and has shown interest in working on motors alongside. He eats and sleeps with restored regularity. Selective mutism is still in effect, a year into our visits. The trigger isn’t yet clear. One hopes the block resolves over time. That’s all we can really do in some cases._

His teachers are informed about his condition, and enough of his history to know where not to tread. He’s a dream for them, an apt pupil and a hard worker and quiet, always quiet. To other students, it’s less so.

A boy approaches Will in the hall, and he stops.

“Freak,” comes the whisper.

Will lifts his eyes enough to see him, taller, blonde, heavyset but far from fat. He looks, to Will’s eyes, like a stereotypical bully, so he turns back to his locker.

"You gonna just turn away?" The boy steps closer and Will tenses entirely. He does not turn to look at him. "Stupid quiet shit. I bet you'd squeal like a girl if I put my fist in your face."

Meaningless violence has never made sense to Will, not in cartoons or stories, not in the schoolyard, and certainly not here. He wonders if the boy even understands what he's threatening, if he even knows what it sounds like when children scream in fear and pain, those wet little sobs when they can't fight anymore. Girls and boys both. Children, all of them just children.

"Hey!" A heavy hand lands on Will’s shoulder and without thought he sets his own atop.

The motion is quick, practiced, instinctive, and it is only when the boy is wailing on the ground, clutching his hand and calling Will all sorts of things that he even realizes he had moved. He closes his locker when a teacher comes to investigate, follows in silence to the principal's office.

His breath hitches, quick gasps not in panic but in the aftermath. Will remembers the feeling acutely from the nights when he would emerge out from squalid dens and into the humid air, stained with neon, on Hannibal's hip. _Adrenaline_ , Hannibal told him, _the biological response to threat and the mechanism that sends the body into fight or flight_.

He fought. Just like he did when a knife found its way to his hand from that of an attacker, just like he did when he held it to a monster's throat and waited for Hannibal to come and finish the job.

"Do you understand what you did?"

A biological mechanism.

Will nods, solemn, and listens from the seat outside the principal's door as they call his father. When he arrives, ruffling Will's hair as he goes, he is unyielding. His dad doesn't let them blame Will's past for this; he stops them abruptly when they start to call him _unstable_ , _a danger_. He makes them play the security video that shows who acted first, and then he takes Will home.

The glass is cool against Will's cheek. He lifts a gloved finger to the window and holds it there until the snowflake on the other side has melted. The first winter in Buffalo, Will wept when he saw snow.

"They said you broke that boy's wrist."

Will tilts his eyes to his father. His lips part and silence hangs between them.

"Did you mean to do that, Will?"

Sucking his bottom lip into his mouth, Will shakes his head. John's soft sigh is cut short when Will grasps his own wrist, then his elbow, then his shoulder in turn.

John can't help but laugh, and Will grins when his dad says, "Good for you."

At home, John sets the kettle to the stove and rests his weight on the counter. Will walks past him, doubles back, returns and rests next to him instead. They wait until the kettle starts to whistle, and John takes it from the stove.

“They said they want you off for a week.”

Will just nods. He supposes suspension is better than expulsion. He waits for his dad to say more. Maybe he’s angry, maybe he has finally had enough of Will’s silence and his avoidance and his sleepless nights. Maybe -

“I’m thinking I’ll take the week off then,” John says, turning to his son with a smile. “And we should go on a fishing trip.”

With a blink, Will regards him at length. And then he smiles, and then grins, and then he laughs - just a breathy little sound - into his arms, folded on the counter. He knows they used to do this, but so long ago now that it’s like trying to recall a movie, seen in snippets without any context. He peeks up from his arms as his dad pours a cup of instant coffee for himself, and drops a bag of chamomile tea - Dr. Bloom’s recommendation - into a mug for Will.

He draws a breath and John looks to him, watching Will when he nods to the window above the sink. Outside, snow is falling, piling in little hills against the glass.

“Ice fishing,” John says. “Lake will be frozen thick enough on top now, but not under it.”

Will crooks a brow, dubious, but can’t stop smiling even though it hurts a little. Muscles get tired easily when they’re not used often, he remembers. He takes up his mug of tea and holds it in both hands, as John does the same, and both lean against the counter.

“Just like that,” his dad agrees. “We’ll dig up an extra thermos or two, make ourselves some sandwiches to take out there. Think the dogs will want to go?”

Will nods, and his smile is vibrant. It’s answer enough.

They don’t go far the next morning, Will holding his dad’s hand tightly as they navigate the ice to a spot John thinks will be particularly good. Fishing is something Will knows he has done, something he knows he has enjoyed, but doing it again, now, after everything, it reminds him of the novels he loves the most. It is patience and quiet, it is sitting still and waiting, with a reward at the end.

His mind needs the release, it needs to be away from the busyness of school, from the crowds there, from the expectations - though he always meets them. He likes it here. John can see it in the way Will’s shoulders relax, the way he stops picking at his cuticles nervously. For all the years he was searching for Will, he blamed. Himself, the bastards who took him, the media who covered it as an extravagant event but who had offered no help when he had approached them. All the years he had hoped and prayed and knew that his boy was out there, he hoped Will would forgive him for not seeking him himself.

Will’s lips purse together, his brows knit. A question, John knows, somehow he knows. They’ve found ways to communicate, he’s learned to discern his son’s creased brow when he wants to know something from when it furrows in unhappiness. He knows that a drawn breath means that Will has something to say, even if he doesn’t say it. And he damn well knows, whether he deserves it or not, that when Will smiles a particular way, he loves him.

He can hear it clear as day, and they don’t need words for that.

So he’s never pushed him - encouraged, now and then, but he leaves that work to the doctor who knows what she’s doing. If Will doesn’t want to talk, if he’s forgotten how in all the shit he’s been dealt - so be it. They’ll figure it out.

John watches as Will lifts his chin, and follows his gaze to the hole they carved in the ice.

“Walleye, mostly,” he answers. “Big things, have a jaw that sticks out.” John mimics it, jutting his lower lip over the top, easing to a smile when Will snorts and his eyes narrow in amusement. “I caught one once,” he continues, holding his fishing rod between his knees, and spreading his hands as far as he can stretch them. Will squints at him, and his dad brings them a little closer together. Still a squint, and he brings them closer.

“Maybe more like that,” John decides.

Will nods, expression worked to one of sage understanding, and turns back to the hole in the ice.

They catch nothing the first day.

Nothing the second.

On the third, Will shifts closer to his dad and rests his head against his shoulder, seeking the contact and comfort from him. He doesn’t blame him. He doesn’t hate him. He hopes, one day, that his father will believe that, he hopes that even if he feels guilty, he knows Will loves him. Will takes a breath, licks his lips, and very quietly murmurs, “I missed you.”

John shuts his eyes and steels his jaw. What little breath he can manage makes a sound as he sighs, and he looks to the boy at his side. His boy. His son, who’s made it through the kind of hell John can’t begin to imagine and back to him, so they can keep fighting through it together.

He sets an arm around Will’s shoulder, slow at first, but when Will leans more he pulls him close. He’s never been one for words, never been as smart as Will, even when he was a little thing, glasses too big for his face and full of questions. Squeezing his eyes, John laughs, breath misting in the air.

“Hell,” he says. “You make me cry out here and it’ll freeze to my cheeks.” His throat clicks when he swallows, and ducking his head, he breathes warmth against Will’s hair. “Every day. Every second of every goddamn day, I missed you.”

Will makes a sound, small and soft, and presses closer. They stay like that until it gets too cold, until the sky starts to darken and they need to make their way back, and only then does Will get a bite.

_Will is determined to throw himself into as many AP classes as he can. His teachers speak highly of him, but I notice that occasionally his desire for knowledge becomes manic. We have discussed the possibility of him going into psychology. Will has an uncanny aptitude for understanding and reading people and is exceptionally empathetic. He has grown, in the three years I have known him, into an extraordinary young man._

Will still runs in the mornings. He had refused an offer to join the track team, contented to spend his time alone or with his father in the shop. After school, he studies, and after study, he runs again. Certain evenings he pushes himself to pain, running hard enough that his muscles scream, even accustomed as they are to being pushed this hard. He runs until he is on the verge of causing himself injury, and then he stops.

Some nights he comes home in the early hours, but no matter his exhaustion, he never misses school.

His grades improve until they can’t go any higher. He debates in class, though always after cautious consideration. He receives a letter one day from the school that tells him he’s graduating on time, and not only that, but as valedictorian.

He hides the letter for almost a month before he decides he’d better tell his dad and Dr. Bloom.

With it tucked beneath his pillow, it still feels like a failure. He has forced himself, again and again, until every little goal set was achieved. Driven to near-obsession to be better than everyone else - better than himself - the victory in this feels like a sucking void in his belly. What else is there to fight for? What _has_ he been fighting for?

His fingers spread, arm tucked beneath his head and pillow both, and he seeks out the little slip of paper that has been hidden there for years. Biting his lip, eyes on the ceiling and radio playing softly beside, Will doesn’t take the note out, but he touches it. Soft edges, well-worn, crumpled and discarded more than once, and always sought again and smoothed.

Will checks the time, and listens to the quiet of the house beyond the soft strains of Bach. Slowly, so slowly, he splays his fingers across his stomach, and pushes them lower.

He has grown into an exceptionally beautiful young man. People have come up to Will to flirt, to ask him for coffee or on a date, both men and women, and Will has found himself turning them all down. He likes his space, he likes his quiet. And no one need know why he doesn’t want a sexual relationship, and why he will not have it with anyone but the one person he cannot have.

He draws the heel of his hand down between his legs, a deliberate rub, gentle, and closes his eyes. He thinks of Hannibal, lying in bed and reading, thinks of how warm he always was, no matter the weather, how soft the hair on his chest when Will nuzzled against it. He thinks of how hesitant Hannibal had always been to kiss or touch, to push Will in any way at all - and that is what he loved about him the most.

Hannibal felt nothing owed.

He wanted to protect, he wanted to care.

Years on, Will understands that he did, that his sending Will away was for the greater good, and yet he cannot get Hannibal out of his mind, he cannot forget the man who saved his life and the man who owns his heart.

Will slips his hand into his shorts with a soft sigh and starts to stroke.

He could, he supposes, turn what little of this particular energy he has in him towards other things. The internet is full of sex, he’s discovered, but there’s a sickly sheen to it all that makes him feel unwell. He could try to force it. Expected things. Normal things.

Or he could keep this.

Him.

Only him.

Will’s hand curls in a slow spiral upwards, squeezing, and he bites his lip to keep himself quiet. He lets his hips arch from the bed and glances down to watch the movement tenting his boxers. In distant whispers, he hears Hannibal explaining to him how bodies work - clinical, factual, sensitive still to Will’s fear at the moment that it happened. That rough, gentle voice becomes almost a purr as Will turns his nose against his own arm, nuzzling with a sigh.

He does not have to let anyone have him this way, ever again.

His voice aches to a whimper as he strokes faster, bare belly clenching towards the ceiling.

Will would have slept with him that night. Smaller hands seeking over Hannibal’s hairy chest, locking together around his shoulders. Skinny legs splayed across Hannibal’s legs as he arched to rut against him.

 _Please_ , Will would have asked. _Please, for me._

He would have been gentle, he would have taken his time and kissed Will’s worries away. He would have held him close, he could have let Will stay on top of him. Never, not once, had Hannibal made Will fear him, had made Will feel uncomfortable around him. Will would have let Hannibal take anything he wanted from him, would have given himself entirely and never once regretted it.

He thinks of Hannibal’s voice, calling him beautiful boy, and remarkable Will, he thinks of the sound of his breathing, something Will had grown so used to hearing, so comfortable in hearing that he still wakes some nights convinced that Hannibal is right there beside him.

Will moans softly, thinking of Hannibal’s hands, of Hannibal’s lips, of his smiles and his laughter, rare and beautiful. Will whispers his name and feels his body release, contented to allow that pleasure to go to Hannibal, to be his entirely. He lies in bed shaking, waiting for the adrenaline to seep away, waiting for his mind to slow down and his breathing to ease, and thinks, instead, of the note beneath his pillow, pressed up against his graduation letter.

_You will be safe_ , it says, _you will be brave. Know I sent you home out of love. Know I love you still, my remarkable boy._

_Hannibal Lecter_


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Ambidexterity can be learned, Will. And it should. One should never rely solely on the dominant hand._
> 
> Hannibal grips the blade in his left, a third shot screaming air-raid siren sharp through his deafness as it passes by his head. The gunman starts to stand from the table but Hannibal does not rise to meet him.
> 
> _Better to bring them to your level, Will, than to find yourself in an uphill battle._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

Blood beads black on the dusty floor.

Hannibal draws the back of his hand across his mouth. A door slams and he turns his head, listening for the pounding of feet but finding only welcome silence. It is a poor reflection on his abilities that he was struck at all, let alone hard enough to let go.

Age has a way of catching up.

On socked feet he follows the sound’s path, up the winding staircase of the brothel and down the hall. There is no one beneath, he has ensured that, with a sleek blade and whispers of hurried Spanish:

 _Go_.

 _Now_.

Through open windows, Maracaibo rings raucous, those offering illicit delights to tourists only matched in volume by those all too ready to accept their offers. Most will never see the inside of the buildings like the one in which Hannibal yet again finds himself; very few will see their upper floors, reserved only for special patrons. He lets the sound settle as if it were waves, a tidal drift of voice and vice, and he listens beyond.

At each door, a pause.

Until behind one, there is a whisper.

The cheap wood splinters beneath Hannibal’s heel, enough of a surprise to the man inside that Hannibal can push aside the young woman struggling in his arms and snare him by the throat instead.

It is tempting to make this quick, to turn his head a certain way and feel the man's weight on his arms. It is tempting. But the girl is at Hannibal’s feet, now, clinging to his legs and whimpering in a language he can’t quite place, and the temptation goes away. 

This man will suffer, but all in due time.

Hannibal’s arm snakes around him and presses against the carotid, feeling the man struggle until he simply doesn’t anymore, body giving up when there is no oxygen to drive it. Hannibal lets the man fall, and gently extricates himself from the little hands that grasp at him so he can kneel and look the girl in the eyes.

“Do you have family here?” he asks her. She shakes her head and starts to quickly explain in her native language again. She looks Eastern European, but speaks a language Hannibal does not. He lets her talk, gesture and try to cover herself before he takes off his jacket to give to her instead.

“Water,” he tells her, and she nods, moving to get up and Hannibal softly coaxes her back down. “For you,” he gestures, and she laughs, nervous and little, swallowing and chewing her lip. Her gaze settles on the man beside her, unmoving, her laughter rising too quickly, too high, not enough breath to fuel it especially when she claps her hand across her mouth.

Hannibal seeks out a bathroom, dumping out the toothbrushes within a plastic glass to the sink. He rinses the glass twice before returning to her. He keeps his distance, crouching slow, and by the time she takes the offered glass, she’s weeping.

“Drink,” he tells her, settling on Spanish. Recognition flickers in her eyes, replaced by wariness as she sips the water, shaking. “Where?”

She shakes her head, big brown eyes wide and red-rimmed.

“You,” he says again, gently. “Where?”

“Moldova,” she tells him.

“How long?”

“Years.”

Where?

China.

Where?

Ecuador.

Where?

Pakistan.

How long?

_Years._

_Years._

_Years._

“Come.”

To another embassy, in another taxi, on another sweltering night in Venezuela.

Hannibal regards himself in the mirror, fingers pressed against the cut in his lip.

It will heal. They all heal. LIttle cuts and bruises, blood and sweat and mucus, all washed away for another night hunting and seeking. But perhaps tonight he will indulge in sadism, tonight he will allow a part of himself free that he so often hides, since Will. Appearing a savior, not a villain, to the children he rescues.

But now she’s gone. And now he’s here.

The skin is the heaviest human organ. This man could stand to lose some of it.

At the hotel, Hannibal’s hands shake, and he recalls telling Will of the biological response his body has to fear, and using strength, and knowing when to survive. He showers. He brushes his teeth. He brushes his hair. He climbs into bed naked and he sleeps until morning.

There is a hum from his phone when he wakes, a new article for him to peruse for the tracked keywords _Will Graham_.

It is all he has now that Will aged out of Alana’s practice. He does not appear anywhere in social networks, nor his father. Hannibal is not surprised by it, but not a day passes when he does not hope. Weeks pass at a time, months, year, two without an alert. The last Hannibal saw was a notice in the local Buffalo paper, the graduation of Will’s high school class.

He was valedictorian, and though - to Hannibal’s dismay, they did not transcribe his speech - therein featured a small image of a striking young man at the podium, hair combed but still curling untamed, glasses perched on his nose and robes dark against his skin. Though the quality was grainy, Hannibal noted that his freckles had faded. Just as keenly, he noticed that Will’s smile did not uplift his eyes.

The thought that Will, still, after so many years may not be happy was enough that Hannibal was forced to stop himself from searching for a flight.

Every time. Every time.

And so this is special, he hopes, a morning that carries with it news. The air sits heavy despite numerous fans, and Hannibal turns to his side, curling around his phone. He readies himself for the disappointment that comes most times, when it is not his Will but another.

But not today.

A school paper from George Washington University, highlighting recent notable achievements on campus. And there. Just there. His name among others whose papers that will be included in a student-run publication on forensics. They do not give the name of the essay, nor any more information than that, but it tells Hannibal enough.

Hannibal wonders if Will knows just how proud of him he is. He wonders if Will even thinks of him at all. He would not blame him if he didn’t. He rereads the article, does a quick calculation in his head. Will is in his second year of college, now. He must be busy with study and extra courses, perhaps he has a partner, perhaps he wants to settle down. Hannibal imagines, sometimes, what Will’s life would have been like had he stayed with Hannibal. Would they have been happy? Would they have been safe? He knows that he could not give Will what he needed, he is not his family, he is hardly a teacher or mentor to idolize. But Will had smiled then, bright and happy. He had smiled that way because of Hannibal.

Some days Hannibal regrets not taking the boat. Perhaps it is time to return to America, perhaps it was time seven years ago, with Will.

Hannibal checks the time and allows himself a little more rest. The day is sweltering, the streets will be busy come evening. He will make himself run when the sun is highest, to keep his body controlled, to push himself enough. He wonders if Will still finds running a chore, or if he even bothers to anymore. He had been such a strong boy, much stronger than he believed himself to be then. He is more so now, Hannibal is sure.

The city is tightly woven - akin to Patpong in that way, Pattaya, Colombo, Recife. Interlocking streets snare together into a web, buildings stacked unsteady upon others, strips of sun or slick neon threading through their canyons. But here, Hannibal has found a genuine challenge, long desired and then desperately sought. He has gathered more scars in Maracaibo, threaded white against tanned skin, than the others combined.

There is a viciousness in its streets that he relishes.

He never did return to his practice, justifying it first with the necessity of this work overseas, later in that any patients he had would long be gone to other doctors. In truth, he could not imagine it, returning to the tedium of taking notations on endless narcissisms. The pretensions of his office. The carefully appointed accommodations of his house. Vast, palatial, and empty.

He would be no help there. Not in the way he is here.

There is still money, carefully parceled from several overseas accounts. Most of what he spends now is that which he takes from those who have gotten it through the worst kinds of cruelties. But he learned, quickly, that Maracaibo’s eyes are sharp. He was followed to the hotel wherein he had been living, nearly compromised, and since then had moved weekly through the city’s various districts. There are no luxuries, now.

_Years._

_Years._

_Years._

During the harder nights, when Hannibal misses him more than he can control, he seeks through school records, he goes through old emails from Alana, detailing Will’s growth and success. There are no photos, there never have been. He knows how compromising it would have been had he asked for them, how Alana would lose her job had she sent them. Though she had encouraged Hannibal and reassured him that John Graham wanted nothing more than to welcome the man who saved his boy into their lives, Hannibal has never made contact.

It is too dangerous for them both, if he were to go and then return. Too dangerous for him if that beautiful boy pulls him from his work. Will would never force Hannibal into retirement, but there would always be that spark, that strange light in his eyes that would herald his curious, soft question.

_How many?_

Hannibal thinks he will keep doing this until he expires or someone’s blade finds home. He cannot give this up and disappoint a boy who means the world to him.

The next article is a listing of new Quantico intakes for profiling, mid-year, invitation only. Of the three taken, Will Graham’s name is listed first. Alana had said once that she thought Will an excellent candidate for a future in psychology. Hannibal can’t help but feel a particular pride that Will chose law enforcement instead.

Brave boy.

There are no more pictures after that, too much a risk to circulate current images of agents-in-training, be it field work or lab. Hannibal wonders, lying in bed as the sun stretches its last golden fingers across the ceiling, how tall Will has grown, how strong, whether he has exchanged glasses for contacts, whether he has cut his hair. He wonders, but he does not mourn.

His Will exists now in another place and another time, and that one is his to keep.

When he dresses, it is in a nondescript, dark shirt. Black trousers. Shoes that will carry him at a run if need be. In his shirt pocket, the same weaponized pen that once circled Will’s laughing image on a printed page. In his pocket, a blade, more for the security of its presence than for its use. He need hardly look now, jaw shadowed in unshaven grey hair, the promise of money in his watch and cufflinks. The predators find him, and bid him to come and meet their girls, all ages, pretty girls, nice girls.

Hannibal smiles, affecting a baffled benevolence, and follows.

The negotiations that flew in Patpong do not fly here; he no longer asks for more than one girl at a time, he rarely finds boys. He makes himself appear experienced but far from confident. Yes, he has bought girls before. Yes, he has enjoyed their company in many countries. Yes, he knows how this works.

 _Young_ , he always says. The younger the better. He can keep their eyes away from the slaughter then, locked safe in a room and away from all of this. The older girls sometimes help, to distract or hurt - they are stronger here, or perhaps they know how to survive more than some of the poor children in Thailand.

Sometimes their help is crucial.

Sometimes they get in the way and Hannibal has no choice but to allow a cut against himself, allow a punch aimed at his jaw, so they don’t get it instead.

In some way, he’s grateful for the opportunity.

Hannibal stands, as girls are paraded before him, clad in little more than undergarments or transparent shifts, and the bruises from the men who keep them. He sets his eyes to the middle distance - he will not leer at them. With the recollection of how Will would work his cuticles raw with anxiety, Hannibal sets his fingers to a cufflink and twists it in nervous diversion.

He leans to the man beside him, who wears a finely-tailored suit that bespeaks of a higher-than-ordinary income, and asks, almost shy, if there are any younger still.

Hannibal knows he has misstepped the moment the words leave his mouth, and their eyes meet.

No matter.

He follows, guileless, further back into the house as unsteady footsteps in heels too high teeter away again. The room to which he is brought requires several keys, and Hannibal takes in the shape of each as it clicks home. Before the latching mechanism snaps open, Hannibal’s hand is on his knife and the man shouts to another inside the room.

“ _Soplón!_ ”

What Hannibal hadn’t accounted for was the likelihood of a gun.

The shot is deafening in the small space, bright enough too that it would give Hannibal pause were his hand not already on the throat of the man at his side. He opens him along his side, from hip to rib until his blade scrapes bone and he pulls it free. The man drops. There are screams, somewhere far away, and another shot that slams into Hannibal’s shoulder alongside the first.

He crouches and lunges low, snaring up the knife he dropped when the second shot connected.

_Ambidexterity can be learned, Will. And it should. One should never rely solely on the dominant hand._

Hannibal grips the blade in his left hand, a third shot screaming air-raid siren sharp through his deafness as it passes by his head. The gunman starts to stand from the table but Hannibal does not rise to meet him.

_Better to bring them to your level, Will, than to find yourself in an uphill battle._

The man’s hamstring curls like a windowshade up the back of his leg as Hannibal frees it from his heel.

If the man cries out, Hannibal doesn’t hear it. Relying only on his sight, he turns his back to the wall of safes and security boxes. Hannibal focuses his gaze on the door, and opens the man’s throat with a splash of scarlet.

He has enough time to breathe, once, and he wastes it in a grimace when doing so gouts blood from the twin holes in his shoulder.

_How many?_

_Only two._

The house vibrates with movement, pounding footsteps he cannot hear but he can feel through the old wooden boards that must predate the bridge by decades. Hannibal lifts his gaze upward and shoves the man to the floor, switching his blade shut as pushes himself unsteadily to standing.

A dark-eyed girl stands in the doorway, lips parted but gaze narrowed. She clutches a robe around herself and takes a step back as Hannibal moves forward.

“Do you work here?” he asks, his Spanish rolling stiff, clumsy across his tongue.

She nods.

“Closed,” Hannibal says. “No more.”

The young woman keeps equal distance between them - when he moves forward, she moves back. When he continues past her out the door of the safe room, she follows. Hannibal glances back to her, his jaw working as if it might take the strain from his body now shaking softly from pain, and he nods towards the room soaked in gore and motionless but for its dripping.

“There is money there,” Hannibal tells her, jerking his head towards the one first gutted. “He has the keys. Share. Go home.”

Vertigo swells in him as he turns again, resting his elbow against the bannister towards the upstairs, never his bare hands. The floor thumps beneath his feet as the girl races to stand in front of him, holding out a palm and speaking words he cannot hear, before clutching her robe again, she races up the stairs. Hannibal can feel eyes on him there, watching wary as he waits. He should not wait. He should go, now.

Hannibal doesn’t make it to the door before she catches him by the arm and turns him. In the girl’s hands are a man’s clothes, rumpled but clean. She speaks, pointing towards the upstairs, and with a sly smile, she marks a line across her throat with her thumb.

 _For you_ , she tells him, as he takes the change of clothes. It will be enough for him to get back to the motel, if he's fortunate. Enough for him not to draw notice once he wraps his old shirt around his shoulder to soak up the blood. The walls round above his head, and Hannibal blinks slow to clear his vision.

No matter.

It is enough.

“How long?” he asks her, giving the room a last glance.

_Years._


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _He won’t need three weeks. He had triangulated a hunting ground for him in the last few months, enough that a single night could yield success, at worst, the week. In the final few days before his departure, the wait had been fraught. After years of bouncing between countries, cities, whole continents, Hannibal has chosen this place to stop moving._
> 
> _Will tries not to imagine why._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

When Will lands in Venezuela, he is greeted by heat and rain. It almost smells familiar, almost too close to things long ago shuttered away, never forgotten but no longer hanging off his shoulders like a monstrous shroud.

Will brings a cigarette to his lips the moment he's cleared the last glass door. He takes his time letting the nicotine filter through his blood again. Too long on a plane, not enough little whiskey bottles to cover a fraction of his usual Friday night indulgence, let alone this place.

At least this time, he chose his own dungeon.

He takes out his phone to write a message to his dad. He doesn’t expect a reply, it's too early in the morning back in Buffalo. The Bureau pays well enough that Will convinced him he doesn’t have to work quite so damn much. Never retirement, he can’t imagine his dad ever lasting more than a day without driving himself crazy needing to fix or build something, but less work and more fishing - that’s something John could get behind. Will still calls the check he sends every month ‘money for the dogs’ and it’s agreement enough.

Will blinks as his phone vibrates in his palm, screen already fogged from the heat.

_Be safe. Stop smoking._

He smiles, and stubs the butt of his cigarette out against his shoe before hailing a cab.

Will called it a vacation, which was met with snorts of laughter from the other agents on his team. There’s no such thing for any of them, really, they try but their job keeps them driven by its very nature. Trafficking never stops, so neither do they, but for raucous nights of whiskey to blow off steam and get themselves to sleep. When he’d told them he was going to Venezuela, they understood.

Not an operation. Nothing official. No, that requires planning and organization, reams of signatures and authorizations needed to hoist the bureaucratic tape that too often limits what they can do. But travel on one’s own dime and time, trips that happen to reveal pockets of poison that need to be flushed out?

There’s no rules against that.

The hotel room is large enough, nothing to break the bank and similar to the one he shared with Hannibal all those years ago. He doesn’t need the space but he likes it, it gives him a sense of comfort, like snuggling into a dream. Another small indulgence he allows himself on the regular.

Will takes his time to settle, choosing one bed of the two, his bag atop the other, and takes a shower with the door open.

He had taken three weeks, this time, though he highly doubts he will need the entire time to search. Hannibal never uses his real name to travel, always pays in cash, but there are ways to track him regardless, patterns to follow, unexplained killings and freed children, eyewitness accounts of a man who saved their life who matches Hannibal's description.

Since high school, Will has tracked him as best he could. With the Bureau's access to information it became a lot easier. Between casework and travel, Will would seek for him. Long-term hotel stays that petered off perhaps two years ago, pockets of killings and saved children, known aliases...

Will lifts his face to the stream and lets the white noise of water fill his skull.

He won’t need three weeks. He had triangulated a hunting ground for him in the last few months, enough that a single night could yield success, at worst, the week. In the final few days before his departure, the wait had been fraught. After years of bouncing between countries, cities, whole continents, Hannibal has chosen this place to stop moving.

Will tries not to imagine why.

In truth, he already knows.

He can feel a clock ticking in time with his pulse, steady rhythmic pressure behind his eyes. Will takes his dinner from a street vendor, warm arepas filled with ham and melted cheese, and makes his way idly towards the area he has all but memorized from maps and whispered rumors. The sun’s scarlet blaze has extinguished into ill-lit night, Maracaibo’s smog like the surface of water above, distorting the city’s glow. Within minutes, a taxi driver pulls alongside and asks him if he’s lost.

Will blinks, wiping his mouth clean on his sleeve and his hands off on his trousers, just another wide-eyed tourist terrified of their own inclinations.

“Looking for someone,” he says.

“What do you need?” the driver responds, his English faring far better than Will’s deliberately poor Spanish.

Will laughs, an easily put-on mask, and shrugs. "A friend of mine recommended I come here. Said he'd meet me but he's late."

He watches the driver's expression flicker through a series of emotions, suspicion, displeasure and finally a nod to match his acceptance of the act. Will allows a moment more of silence and then steps closer, leaning in through the window.

"I just landed," he admits. "I don’t even know what time it is here, my mind isn't used to it yet. Can you -" A pause, deliberate, but beyond a bored raising of an eyebrow Will finds no malicious inclination to offer anything. It is a relief, honestly. A lot of cab drivers work for the mobs, the gangs that run the under-city. "Can you drive me to his place? My friend, I mean, I know where he’s staying and I can kick his ass to hurry up."

The driver tilts his head to the back of the car, and Will slides in. He doesn’t know the name of the motel, he admits, to a sigh from the front, but he has a general idea of where it is. Will ensures the man he’ll pay for his trouble if he can give him a lift to any motels located right around there.

He tells the driver he’ll know it when he sees it.

Through single-lane streets, tourists and locals part alongside the taxi as it makes its way slowly from resorts and hotels to a dingier area. Louder. More crowded. Will’s internal clock ticks faster as they pass girls - hardly women, though painted to be - in scarce clothing, leaned against by men whose posture makes their intentions clear. His mouth dries but he forces himself to swallow, and surveys the motels as they wind through the neighborhood.

Will knows he’s near, whether whole or harmed, hunting or at rest, he can feel his stomach twist tighter and he knows. One motel is dismissed, immediately, for its garishly lit lobby. Another for its presence too close to a city square.

"That one," Will says at last, and the cab pulls up next to a small place, cleaner than the others and just out of the way enough to work. He can see the large bins at the side of the building; a back door, then, easy to jam with carefully palmed tape for later use.

Will sits forward and pays, thanking the driver again and again, attempting another awful Spanish phrase to have the man snort, resigned to being charmed, if nothing else.

When the car pulls away, Will immediately crosses the street for the little place. There is an evening clerk, and Will knows that he is lucky enough to catch him - this is hardly a 24-hour all-access place. Will smiles at the young man and says a name, one of Hannibal’s aliases. He gets a smile in answer - he knows Hannibal, the man probably greets the clerk nightly as he makes his rounds.

He is directed to the third floor, and takes the steps, not the elevator, feet cat-silent on the stairs. He knows only that he is itching for a fight, harsh whispers if need be but something significant. He needs Hannibal to know, he wants him to, that that little boy has not forgotten, has not yet forgiven.

There is music playing softly from within the room, and Will slows as he comes to the door. Myaskovsky’s _Diversions_. His breath stops. He stops.

Beneath him, the floorboards creak, and the whispers of movement inside the room go silent. Will lifts a shaking hand to the peephole and rests his brow against. Nearly sixteen years since a flimsy door was broken down between them, and no more than that separates them now.

He lifts a hand to knock and the door gives way. Steel glints, flashing sharp, and then holds the light where it freezes against his stomach. A breath, so fragile it cracks.

Before him, Hannibal stands motionless. His hair has grayed, so too the stubble lining his jaw. The wrinkles that Will knew then have deepened into fissures from strain and time, but his dark eyes are the same, just the same, as those in which Will sought his safety, his sanctuary. Half-dressed for the hunt, shirtless and barefoot still, his body a roadmap of blades and bullets.

Hannibal lets the blade lower. He lets it drop. And he sighs, softening.

“Will?”

Whatever words of anger Will had for him, of abandonment and expectations, of love and how Hannibal knew not the meaning or how to give it - they all vanish and he manages just another breath, another, and feels his heart swell, seeing the man again.

He draws a hand against his face, nails bitten to the quick on the flight over, and rubs his lips before letting them part on a sigh and a smile both.

"Will," he agrees, lifting his eyes to Hannibal's and holding their gaze.

Hannibal sweeps the knife back across the floor of his room with his foot, and steps back, enough for Will to follow, and when he does Hannibal pushes the door closed behind him. He hardly blinks, he can’t - he won’t relinquish even that instant to reflex, not after so long. Dark eyes take in the scope of the man - not a boy - who stands before him.

Broad shoulders and strong legs. Nearly as tall as Hannibal. Teeth white and straight behind lips that rest slightly parted. The same unruly mop of hair, soft wild curls. The same bottle-blue eyes, luminous behind thin wire frames. Hannibal allows himself to blink, and sees a laughing, gangly boy with freckles spattered beneath his eyes. The salt-burn of the sea singes his throat as it did that day, long ago, when he draws a breath.

He blinks again, and there is Will.

Just there.

“I did not think I would - ever again,” Hannibal struggles. His words fail him. He has never rehearsed this, he has never dared to imagine it. When he swallows, his throat clicks, and he whispers, “I am so proud of you.”

Will’s brows furrow and it’s suddenly hard to think, hard to breathe. He thinks of Alana giving him the word _love_ to respond to, in session, and his response. His lips work carefully before he parts them, resists the urge to bite his nails again, to whip out a cigarette, to ask for a drink. Self-soothing mechanisms developed over years and years, controlled enough to never be a problem, but addictive regardless.

But Hannibal had followed his news, he had read about him getting into Quantico, he had read about his essay, his intake, his work in the field perhaps. He had cared.

He had _cared_.

“I was angry at you,” Will whispers. “For years. For _years_ , Hannibal. Because you had sent me away and sent not a word. I think I’ve replaced the cover on the last book you gave me three times by now, the pages are curled,” he laughs, nervous, his words flowing from him like a flood. “I didn’t know you kept up.”

Hannibal’s fingers spread, stretching, returning feeling through the numbness that overwhelms him, every nerve in his body focused. He is dizzy with it.

“Always,” Hannibal tells him, a smile slowly softening the shock, the desperation of years held tenuously at bay. “Always. Every morning when I woke, I looked for news of you. Every evening before sleep, I checked again. The editors at the Buffalo News grew exhausted with anonymous emails sent to them, asking why they would not refine their focus to a smaller scale - why they had not transcribed your graduation speech.”

Years and years and years.

Hannibal lifts his hand to his face, breathing a laugh into it. He turns his back to the door as Will passes so that he can rest against it and steady himself.

“I have never felt more dismay and relief as when you were out of Dr. Bloom’s care and on your own,” he admits. “And university. Quantico.” He lets his hand fall and sighs, a smile drawing deep the wrinkles around his eyes. “Remarkable boy.”

Will swallows, ducks his head and lifts only his eyes. Same eyes that had begged for help, years ago on the streets of Patpong, same eyes that had lit up at the thought of going on a boat ride with Hannibal. His smile is little but it narrows his eyes, it feels as warm as any smile he ever sends his father, true and kind and filled with meaning.

“I’d hoped you would - that she would tell you,” Will says. “Dr. Bloom was very kind to me, I owe her a great deal. We stay in touch, sometimes. She tries to coerce me into psychology again and I,” Will laughs again, shakes his head. “My place isn’t in an office. I want to be just like you.”

He steps closer, just a step, and shoves his hands into his pockets, shoulders curved, though much broader now, much stronger. Here is a man, before Hannibal, not the sweet boy he had saved.

“I missed you,” Will adds softly. “Beyond reason. Beyond… anything. I missed you. And I loved you.” He swallows, watches Hannibal, strong beautiful Hannibal, who has changed only in age and scars from the man Will had kept in his memory palace and sought comfort from. “I tried to seek out other partners. Girls, boys, both asked. And I went, sometimes, but it never amounted to anything. Not with people my age, not with the secrets of my past between us like a chasm. And then I realized… There was nothing I could give them. Not in the way they wanted. Empty sex is beyond me, and intimacy? Intimacy belonged to someone I love, and no one else.”

Will takes a breath, slow, and releases it carefully. “And I love you. Always have.”

Only then does Hannibal let his eyes close, to hear the words that resonate in him, to feel how the air itself comes alive and electric with Will’s presence again. He is a thunderstorm that eases the suffocation of humidity. He is the ocean air, bright and clean.

He is everything.

He has always been.

“And so you followed me.”

“Yes,” Will whispers.

“And you came here to find me.”

“Yes.”

Hannibal smiles, helpless, and opens his eyes again enough to see Will so near, so near, after so long. If Will goes again - when he does - Hannibal will not survive it. He does not want to. The world has color with Will in it, a vibrant and beautiful place. He gives Hannibal’s world hope and meaning. He gives Hannibal a reason.

“I have missed you,” Hannibal murmurs. “And I have never stopped loving you.”

Will makes a sound, little and nervous, and his smile splits wide, bright, as he takes the last step necessary to press up against Hannibal and kiss him.

His body feels like fireworks exploding up against his skin. It is like joining a part of him that has been severed, that had been brutally torn away and now he has it back, can fuse it to his skin and never let it go again. His hands come up to frame Hannibal’s face and he whimpers, sweet and warm, against him before parting his lips and letting the kiss deepen between them.

When they break to breathe, both make a sound, desperate little gasps, shivering needy things. Will presses his nose up against Hannibal’s and refuses to let him go, nuzzling him gently before pressing his lips to Hannibal’s again and wrapping his arms up over his shoulders. Hannibal’s hands hover and settle against Will’s cheeks, fingers spreading through silky curls as soft as he remembers. Their mouths move slowly together, seeking to relearn what neither have truly forgotten.

And then faster. Firmer. Hannibal slides his hands down Will’s chest where his heart beats quick, across his belly. They press against his back and with lips parted only enough to moan low against Will’s mouth, Hannibal ducks to snare Will by the thighs and lift him from his feet. The door bangs as he leans back against it beneath both their weight, mouths enmeshed in a furious tangle, an intensity that could only burn so hot for the other.

“Forgive me,” Hannibal whispers, between the frantic twining of their lips. “My deceits. The ship. My silence. Forgive me,” he breathes, supporting Will against one arm when Will snares his legs around Hannibal’s hips, and grasping his hair in a gentle tug. “For missing so many birthdays when I should have been there to kiss you.”

“We have time,” Will breathes, rocking up against him, holding close with arms and legs and pressing tight to Hannibal entirely. “You’re here. We have time.”

The kisses linger between desperate and delicate, careful nips become long presses, licks become bites become a tangle of tongues. It is intoxicating, and Will feels alive for the first time since he realized Hannibal was not on the boat with him and had to be restrained by three people to keep him from diving into the water and swimming back to shore.

They are here, now, together. Alive and fighting and heroes to a corrupt and frightening world.

Will turns to nuzzle him again, hands grasping and holding Hannibal tight, and he realizes they are both trembling, both so caught up in the other that they are lightheaded and nervous and entirely inescapably in love.

“Take me to bed,” Will whispers. “Please, Hannibal.”

With a shaking sigh, lips brushing warmly together, Hannibal smiles.

“I can deny you nothing.”


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _He sought not company after Will, and years before had similarly held focus only on his work. There was no one worth the distraction, and then no risk worth allowing._
> 
> _And then there was Will._
> 
> _And no one else could ever compare._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by our beloved [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/)!

Years, Hannibal has imagined Will grown, and no depth of detail in the machinations of his memory palace could compare to the wonderful weight against him now as he carries Will towards the bed.

Years, Hannibal has fought between agony and relief, that he refused Will’s suggestions and temptations, childish but entirely genuine.

Years, erased now as Hannibal turns to lay back against the bed, Will atop in fierce pursuit, their hips rounding to push their bodies together in a slow uncoiling.

Hannibal tilts his head aside when Will’s teeth graze his cheek, and his tongue traces down across his pulse. Beautifully bowed lips close against Hannibal’s neck and when Will sucks he makes a sound that avalanches into a moan from Hannibal. Hannibal is helpless to him, he has always been. He will always be, for as long as he lives.

“I ached,” Will whispers, pressing himself against Hannibal, driven as much by animal need as childish wonder. He wants this man, has always wanted him, and now that they’re here he feels just as helpless. “I wondered for so long if you found me tainted, repugnant, if that was why you didn’t want me.”

Will bites his lip and lets his hands skim down Hannibal’s chest.

“I was going to beg you,” he adds, smiling, eyes narrowed as he remembers his 14 year-old self squirming in the seat of the boat, before he realized Hannibal was not on it. “I was going to give myself to you, that day.”

Hannibal lets himself laugh - in truth, he can’t stop it, no more than he can control the wildfire heat of his pulse or where it pools, tightening in the pit of his stomach, filling between his legs. There is guilt, still, distantly - like an old bruise that kept getting banged before it could heal fully. He shakes his head and grasps Will’s hair again; he doesn’t pull but for a little tug, just enough to turn them to their sides.

“You are - have always been - the purest heart I’ve ever known,” he whispers, placing kisses along the strong curve of Will’s jaw, unshorn bristles scraping soft against his lips. “I do not know how much longer I could have fought it,” he admits, eyes narrowing in delight. “Beautiful, devious Will. How many times you nearly broke my resolve.”

Will’s lips part for Hannibal’s thumb as he traces their soft recurve.

“And now?” Will asks.

“Broken,” Hannibal laughs again, eyes closing as he sinks into another kiss. “Entirely broken.”

Will kisses back, cheeks flushed, just pink beneath his eyes and over his nose, and Hannibal can see his freckles, faded, but there. Will’s hands reach, hesitant, to work open the buttons of Hannibal’s shirt, arching his back to press closer and allow Hannibal to unbutton his in turn. He is nervous. He’s over a decade older than when Hannibal found him and yet he is still nervous. That Hannibal will not like him, that he will not do something right.

His practice had never been consensual, he had never genuinely learned anything beyond when to keep quiet and how to turn to avoid a slap. He is hardly versed in the arts of lovemaking since he has never made love, but with Hannibal, Will is prepared to plunge into that unknown. His body throbs with want for him already, heat between his legs and in a blush down his cheeks and neck. He laughs, too, and lifts his eyes to Hannibal, closing them and wrinkling his nose when the older man removes his glasses carefully and sets them away.

“I won’t break,” Will whispers, encouraging, and brushes his lips with Hannibal’s again. “And I want you.”

The sweetness of his voice, the slender fingers that guide Hannibal’s shirt back from his shoulders and slip curling against his chest - he is so familiar, a presence that Hannibal knows singularly from all others. Gentle and shy, brave and clever. His Will, still his. And yet he is changed, all of those things but _more_. Bold and courageous and more beautiful in his way than Hannibal could have ever foreseen.

A remarkable boy, indeed, who could have the world expected of him and exceed even that.

Hannibal works Will’s shirt free, tugs off the one beneath over his head. Ducking his head, he follows Will’s collarbone with his mouth, closing against it, lower to feel the skitter of his heart. He noses against a hard little nipple, and parts his lips against it to suckle.

“Tell me how,” Hannibal murmurs, breath cooling over the damp, pebbled nub and gusting goosebumps against Will’s skin. “Tell me what you wish of me, so I know, and you will have it, Will. Anything.”

“Everything,” Will laughs, biting his lip and letting it go. “You know more than me.” His hands slip through Hannibal’s hair, careful to card through and not tug, not yet. He shifts on the bed, enough that Hannibal is more atop him than beside, and carefully, Will draws his knees up around Hannibal to balance him between.

“I want you,” he repeats. “Your mouth and hands and -” A swallow, the word still vile on his tongue but Hannibal understands, he kisses the taste away. “We can see… see what we both like, and what we can adjust to fit. We have time. We have all the time in the world. I’m not going to leave you.”

Hannibal’s smile widens, and he presses into a long kiss when their mouths come together again, and again. He quiets the protest inside himself, the disbelief. It doesn’t matter now.

He reaches back to slip Will’s legs a little higher around his waist and rocks gently down against him. Languid strokes, Hannibal all but inexpert in this too after so long without. He sought not company after Will, and years before had similarly held focus only on his work. There was no one worth the distraction, and then no risk worth allowing.

And then there was Will.

And no one else could ever compare.

Hannibal’s breath leaves him when their cocks brush, both pulsing hard when friction rubs hot against them. The sweep of tongues joins them, moans muted between their mouths, but Hannibal watches, he pays attention to every tremor that ripples through Will’s body. He will stop in an instant if he need, he will not allow something like this to risk betraying the trust that somehow, somehow has been granted him.

Will makes a fussy noise as Hannibal breaks from their kiss, lips flushed red and swollen. Downward across his chin, tongue dipping to the hollow of his throat where sweat beads in the Venezuelan heat. Over his sternum, his heaving ribs, firm belly trailing tufts of dark hair downward. Hannibal works open Will’s belt, his pants, he breathes into every cavern of his being the scent of Will hot and vibrant beneath him, and slips his pants from his hips.

Will arches his back to let him, laughing against his hand when Hannibal stops to unlace his boots, to toss them to the floor with his socks before baring Will fully and properly. Here, Will does not feel vulnerable, he does not feel flayed by hungry eyes, he feels worshipped. Hannibal takes him in slowly, every inch of skin that Will spreads and shows him. Will is alive for him, breathing and strong and self-made and here.

Will bites his lip again and digs his heels into the bed, pushing himself to sit up and hook a finger through Hannibal’s belt, tugging him down as Will lies back again.

“Every time I touched,” Will whispers, fingers deft in undoing the leather belt holding Hannibal’s pants. “Every time, I thought of you.” The button next, the zipper, and Will keeps his eyes on Hannibal as he slips a hand into his pants and into his underwear and strokes his cock. “Just you.”

Hannibal lets his voice break against Will’s shoulder, and he lets himself imagine Will, cursing his name no doubt, praising it in breathless whispers as he allowed himself that pleasure. Hannibal lets himself be touched. Strong hands, calloused rough, and slender fingers curling firm. A kiss is dragged through the scruff of Will’s cheek, another pushed to the corner of his lips, and Hannibal presses their brows together and watches Will’s cheeks ruddy. His hips rock to set steady motion to Will’s hands, both curled around him.

“What have I ever done,” Hannibal murmurs, “to be so lucky?”

He grazes his knuckles down Will’s arms, muscles flexing, fiercely honed. Down the canyons of his ribs to the hollow of his pointed hip, over the tender skin of his belly, further -

Will’s voice pitches high, honey-sweet, as Hannibal spans a palm through coarse curls of hair and takes him in hand. Pulse beating against his fingers as Hannibal presses them along the vein beneath, he brings his palm up across the head of Will’s cock, follows its curve towards his belly, spreading clear fluid as he strokes back down. Nuzzling his cheek, he learns the contours of a part of Will’s body he did not let himself know.

From where they are now, Hannibal is glad that he did not. And yet, Will watches him, wide eyes inky where his pupils have pushed out blue. And yet, Will seeks from him, lower lip bitten rosy between his teeth.

“I could not think of anyone else,” Hannibal smiles, eyes narrowed in pleasure as Will releases his lip and his mouth unfurls with a gentle little noise. “I sought no one. Wanted no one. You have held my attention for a lifetime, beautiful Will. I could not share myself with anyone else.”

Will sighs out harsh, blush darkening but hardly in humiliation. He does not feel used, here, does not feel humiliated. He does not feel like a thing to fuck, but like someone opening up to their partner, their lover, for the first time. And that is what it is. That is what they are.

Will arches up to kiss Hannibal again, gently, and sets his hands to his hips to work Hannibal’s pants down his body as well. No shoes to fight with for him, but Will catches himself laughing as socks tangle in pant legs and they both lose balance and bounce a little on the bed where they land.

It is fun. For the first time in his life it is _fun_ for Will to be in bed with someone, laughing at the silliest things, the dumbest mistakes that to Will feel like failures and to Hannibal are the most endearing things in the world. They do find their balance, their rhythm together, hands against each other and rocking down at the same time, rubbing in tandem, crawling closer and closer to release together.

“You feel so good,” Will whispers, nuzzling against Hannibal’s cheek, pressing a wet little kiss there as he spreads his legs wider and arches up, inviting without saying it.

“And you,” Hannibal laughs slow, turning Will’s cheek aside with a kiss, seeking his ear. “Look at you.” He teases the shell of Will’s ear with his tongue, draws the lobe between his lips to suck. Will bends from the bed, squirming, his laugh free and clear and perfect, even as it dips again into a moan and he wraps his arms around Hannibal’s neck, coaxing him to continue. Little wet sounds against his ear, the press of teeth.

All so new.

All so entirely wonderful.

Dipping finger tips into his own mouth, Hannibal slips a hand down Will’s thigh, sighing when his legs wrap around his hips once more and hold him close. He grasps Will’s backside, firm and warm to the touch, and squeezes. Carefully, he spreads, fingers seeking inward but not touching yet.

“Are you certain?” He asks, uncertain still, but smiling as their noses brush. “I am content, I am more than, just as we are -”

Will’s smile pulls feline, and he turns his face against Hannibal’s and kisses soft against stubbled skin. He is certain. The only thing he is sure he has been certain of his entire life. That this man, and this act, and this intimacy belong to him, that they are meant to be, time and again, waiting and waiting and waiting until -

“How long did Pelagia wait for Antonio?” Will asks, licking his lip into mouth as Hannibal blinks at him, a smile curling warm. 

“Through the war and past it.”

“As I waited,” Will murmurs, slipping one hand down from around Hannibal’s shoulders and to his wrist instead, guiding him closer, until Hannibal’s fingers press against the tight ring of muscle there. Will takes a breath, quick and surprised, and looks up at Hannibal again. “I am very certain.”

Never, not once, did Hannibal consider this as possibility. Never, not once, would he have tried. But the assurance of Will’s words, the authority in granting this, asking for it knowing - Hannibal will not deny him his right to that.

“Nothing,” Hannibal sighs, smiling. “I can deny you nothing, Will Graham.”

Steady slow circles ring Will’s entrance, the skin gathered in soft wrinkles beneath his fingers, coarse hair. Hannibal wets his fingers again, to dripping, and the taste of Will spins his senses and he touches him again, pressing carefully inward. The muscle there bends with his touch, just to the first knuckle, until he feels Will breathe again and widen his legs to the bed. The second knuckle in delicate movements passes into the heat of Will’s body. The third.

Hannibal curses, his cock so stiff it hurts, dripping thick dollops clear against Will’s belly.

This doesn’t hurt. This is nothing compared to the agony Will had thought he would have to live with for the rest of his life. This is good, this is strange and tingling and involuntary, this is careful and considerate and loving. He clenches his muscles just a little and laughs, breathless, when Hannibal’s cock twitches against his belly.

He wants him.

He knows he always has.

“I won’t break,” Will whispers, arching his hips a little more still for Hannibal to press deeper, for him to line up another finger and penetrate Will with two. Will presses his lips together in a soft moan and parts them again, laying languid in bed, his own cock curved hard against his belly, proof enough - if nothing else - of how much he wants this.

Hannibal has no mind for his own hardness. No mind for how many nights he spent shamefully washing stickiness from his stomach when the thoughts of Will became too acute. He watches instead in rapt wonder as Will coils and spreads, stretches and clenches, trembling with pleasure and neither fear nor pain.

“Look at you,” he says again, and Will spreads his hand over his face and laughs again. Hannibal brings him to a moan when he spreads his fingers, brings him to shaking when he curls his fingers and presses, stroking the firm nub inside. Threads of precome join the spreading slick on his belly to the tip of his cock, pulsing in time with his heart.

“I want this,” Hannibal breathes, raw confession purring heat from deep in his chest. “I want you, just so. I have, I have for so long -”

“Then have,” Will asks, brows uplifting. He grins crooked and tugs Hannibal’s hair, delight gathered in the corners of his eyes when Hannibal bends for him. “Please, Hannibal.”

“A moment,” he whispers, gently withdrawing his fingers. Will’s arms tighten around him and Hannibal brings his hands over Will’s firm biceps, up to his wrists. Extricating Will’s hands from the back of his neck, Hannibal presses them to his mouth, kissing each palm in turn. “Only a moment,” Hannibal laughs, before he untwines himself to stand, and pad bare towards the makeshift kitchen across the little room.

Will watches him, hoisting himself up on his elbows, legs still spread and belly trembling with tension. He watches Hannibal’s strong form, pale scars over him where he did not have them before, and those that Will remembers tracing as a child. He wonders, still, what they are. He wonders if Hannibal will tell him. He wants to share everything with him.

When Hannibal bends to open a drawer, Will lets himself drop to the bed again and stares at the ceiling instead. He curls one hand up above his head, fingers pressing to the cheap plaster wall behind the bed, and his other he slips around his cock, stroking slow and lazy as he thinks of how they are here, they are finally here.

When Hannibal returns, Will laughs, he can’t help it, turning on his side and drawing his legs up not out of fear or wanting to hide but because he is overcome so suddenly by giggling that he can barely control it.

“Oil?” he manages, biting his lip and rolling back, pushing himself to sit up and stroke over Hannibal’s chest.

An instant between them draws in Hannibal’s brows, scarcely there, a shadow of a hint of a movement. He realizes, as he watches Will kiss through the thick, silver hair on his chest, that this is unfamiliar to him. He knows why. His heart staggers with the realization and Will’s lips pause above it before pressing gently again.

“Yes,” Hannibal smiles, a little wry. “We must make do with what is available. I have not had reason to keep aught else.”

He sighs as Will’s teeth graze a nipple, small and dark and already stiff. When he closes his mouth around it and hollows his cheeks, Hannibal nearly loses himself, knees weakening. He sinks his fingers through Will’s hair and gently turns their mouths together, bent above him but worshipful, adoring.

Will smiles crooked, mischievous, when he pulls away and Hannibal releases him, watching this extraordinary man lay back across his bed. Will is nearing thirty, but in this, still half that, young and lithe, endlessly curious.

Hannibal uncaps the bottle and tips it into his hand, watching Will watching him as he strokes the oil glistening along his cock. Drawing a leg beneath himself, he sits again, and moves when Will grasps him to pull him atop. Slick fingers spread between his legs as they kiss, and Hannibal aligns himself, their breaths held.

“I love you,” whispers Hannibal. “Always.”

Will’s breathing stutters, lips parted and eyes wide, and he watches Hannibal as he slowly starts to press into Will, oil warm and slicking the way to make it easier. It doesn’t hurt, it isn’t a cruelty, it is a discovery that has them both entirely in awe of the other. Will’s fingers slip through Hannibal’s hair and down his back. His knees draw up higher and thighs wider the deeper Hannibal pushes in and slowly, starting as panting little breaths, Will makes sounds of surprised pleasure.

Every shift, thrust after every shallow thrust as Hannibal pushes further into his boy, is enough to draw little whimpers, soft little whines. Will’s fingers press to Hannibal’s skin, draw marks over his back. He squirms, delighted and full, and relaxes on a sigh before clenching around Hannibal again.

“Fuck, is this what it feels like?” he whispers, licking his lip into his mouth and releasing it before kissing Hannibal against the corner of his mouth, a sloppy little thing.

Brave, remarkable Will.

“Yes,” Hannibal tells him, seeking another clumsy kiss, until their smiles widen enough to part them, until their grins become breathless laughter and their bodies move in sync. It is the truth. This is what it feels like, what it should, what it will now and never again the way it was before. A warm joining of two bodies whose hosted hearts want nothing more than to be pressed so close. A union, wrapped in trembling limbs and sealed between their kiss.

Had Hannibal never known the delicious pressure of Will’s body around his own, when he wraps his legs high against Hannibal’s ribs and holds him close, had Hannibal never known the heat and passion of him, moaning with rich and profound depth when Hannibal takes his cock in hand, had he never known a moment of this - but had he known that Will was somewhere safe and happy - it would have been enough.

It would have meant everything.

It does.

Even now, as Hannibal twists his spine and pushes a little faster. Even now as he tilts his hips to brush the head of his cock in quick strokes against the spot that makes Will’s laugh shake free again. Even now, with Will’s hand against his cheek and his tender lips squeezing into a messy kiss, the smile that curves in elation between them mean more than everything else.

“Faster?” Hannibal asks, laughing low and helpless as he sucks a kiss against Will’s throat, scruff tickling his nose. “Slower? Tell me, please, Will - teach me.”

“Oh god, everything,” Will laughs, sweaty and soft beneath him, hands skimming Hannibal’s strong arms, tracing his scars, digging his fingers into slick skin when Hannibal pushes against him _right there_. It feels so good, so, so good he can barely breathe.

“Slower,” Will finally decides. “Harder. I want to feel you for days, I want -”

He is shivers and movement, panted breaths and bright smiles and he is beautiful. And he is enjoying this. Every drawn breath and arch of his body, every trembling spread of his thighs. He is open, he is here, he is entirely lost in the motion of their bodies, riding up against Hannibal as he thrusts into him, gripping the sheets, his own hair, Hannibal’s shoulder, again and again.

“I love you,” Will breathes. “I love you.”

Hannibal’s voice splinters sharp, the sound muffled against the curve of Will’s shoulder. He grasps the sheets beneath and stills but for the involuntary motions of his hips, and this - this Will understands. Not what once was but what is now, a physical expression of love that has run deep and constant over years, over distance, over all the obstacles that now seem so small.

He wraps his arms around Hannibal’s shoulders and holds to him, as Hannibal’s breath leaves him all at once and his arm tightens to stroke. Through long lashes, dark eyes, focused on Will in drowsy bliss. And when Will too commits his love in stripes of heat between them, a joyful sob aches from within.

Hannibal no longer sees the boy he once knew, as Will touches trembling kisses to his shoulder, his chest as he rises and works himself free to wrap his arms around Will and drag him close. He sees the man that has arisen from that savage inferno, rebuilt from ashes.

This is not a consummation.

This is a beginning.


	20. Chapter 20

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _They will return again. To Sri Lanka and Thailand, to Venezuela and Moldova. They will travel, together, when Hannibal takes time from his newly-renewed patient list and Will from the Bureau._
> 
> __How many? __
> 
> _Hundreds._

**Epilogue**

Will extends his stay in Venezuela another two weeks, and when he returns, he books two tickets home.

The FBI office calls him in immediately and although he agrees, he makes sure that Hannibal is settled into the little house in Wolf Trap before he goes. It is a relief when he sleeps before Will has even gone out the door, the dogs all greeted and fed, some crowding the bed with Hannibal on it, others following Will with their tails lazily wagging.

He does not go into the office long. Long enough to give a report, written quickly on the flight home, long enough to put forward a request for an official investigation. Long enough for Jack to look at him and with a sigh allow him another week of time at home before he returns.

The unit is always busy. It will remain that way when he returns, and he is their best.

When Will gets home, Hannibal is still asleep, and without doing more than pulling off his boots and coat, Will crawls in beside him, arms around Hannibal’s middle, and nuzzles against the back of his neck to sleep as well.

A breath from the man beneath his arms stirs him just as his body grows heavy.

“You didn’t eat,” Hannibal murmurs. Grasping Will’s wrist, he brings his palm to his lips, touching a kiss.

“Earlier,” Will says, but he can hardly hide the smile when Hannibal makes a disapproving noise in response. “I will,” he adds. “But I missed you.”

“Your dogs overtook the bed in your absence.”

“They do that.”

Hannibal smiles softly against Will’s fingertips. He did not ask why the bed is in the living room - he understands already. Nor did he ask why so many dogs live here - that too makes sense without requiring explanation. Will’s home is quiet, distant, as far in feel from the sickly glow of neon against smog-ceilinged skies as Hannibal could imagine. No ceaseless honking fills the night air, no shouting. There is no one within miles but Will and his dogs.

And Hannibal.

He turns slowly to face Will, stroking his knuckles down his cheek, watching him as he always does. Disbelief and wonder, relief now that he too has been pulled from the endless loop of violence and repair that has for two decades defined his life. Hannibal seeks Will’s kiss and returns it, softly.

“Has the Bureau survived in your absence?”

Will hums. “Jack claims I am invaluable and then allows me another week of leave,” Will smiles, letting his eyes close again. “He’s an astute man. Soon he’ll be asking what your name is and profiling you as appropriate candidate for his best profiler.”

“Will I pass?” Hannibal asks, amused, and Will just snorts.

“Even if you don’t he can go fuck himself. I’m not leaving you.”

It has become easier in the last few weeks together, to speak, to understand. The awe is still there, for them both, but the pressure to appear as something neither are has dissipated. They love each other, they know each other deep enough that nothing will break them. Will’s breathing eases before Hannibal can ask another question and he just watches Will sleep for a while, until his own eyelids droop and another dog quietly jumps up on the bed to make itself space between them.

\---

“I’d like you to come to Buffalo with me,” Will says, stirring his coffee despite there being no sugar or milk in there to dissolve. He waits, a moment, another, and lifts his eyes. “Just for the weekend.”

Hannibal draws his lips together, holding them for a moment between his teeth. Half-awake, but always awake before Will has to leave, he settles his hands around his own chipped mug and takes a sip.

What they are is indefinite, defiant of any description or explanation that would make sense beyond themselves. And in spite of that, in spite of it all, what they are is stable. Secure. Comfortable, always, as Will sets his feet to Hannibal’s lap, and the older man lowers a coffee-warm hand to rub.

“Is it wise?” Hannibal asks, gently.

“I would like for you to come with me,” Will says again. Hannibal lets the steam from his cup mask his smile, and inclines his head. His worry remains, but as in all things, Will’s certainty supersedes. Hannibal trusts him, and his chest aches at the thought that Will would want them to meet - the two men who have spent the whole of their lives wishing nothing more than to see him safe and whole.

“How could I say no?” he answers, glancing to the little dog at his side, who barks sharp as their eyes meet. “And they?”

“They,” Will says, easing one foot down to gently nudge the feisty little creature. “Get to be spoiled for a weekend by Dr. Bloom. She comes down with her dog, enjoys the space.”

Hannibal blinks, and Will ducks his head on a smile. He cannot bring himself to call her Alana, though she has asked him many times to try. To him, she will always be the kind and patient woman who did not give up on him through silence and tantrums and self-harm. She is as much a hero to Will as Hannibal is.

“They’re used to it,” Will adds. “The times I go away, my colleagues actually ask to babysit the things.”

Hannibal draws a breath, and Will’s brows raise.

“I’m concerned,” Hannibal begins.

“Oh?”

He makes a grave sound, regarding Will across the table. His thumb presses deep along the curve of Will’s sole, and into his mug, Hannibal murmurs, “I’m uncertain I can last an entire weekend without kissing you.”

His thumb bends, and Will snorts a laugh, jerking his foot free of the tickling.

\---

After weeks of relearning the other - what their lives have been, who they have become - and after weeks of knowing each other anew - the rhythms of their existence, the intricacies of their bodies - they came to talk at length of what becomes of them.

Not in relation to each other. Neither could let go, nor would allow their separation again.

But with respect to the secret life that Hannibal has lead, the same life that lead him in turn to Will, long ago. There is an outlet now, for information to circulate to the Bureau, official actions taken and with the use of those facilities, the breaking up of larger rings than Hannibal might ever hope to achieve on his own. And there are means, under the table but known intimately to both, that their combined effect will be more immediate.

They will return again. To Sri Lanka and Thailand, to Venezuela and Moldova. They will travel, together, when Hannibal takes time from his newly-renewed patient list and Will from the Bureau.

_How many?_

Hundreds.

For now, though, they sit content, one beside the other. Will drives and Hannibal watches, smiling each time the station changes and Will knows the composer within a measure. Beyond, the snowy expanse of New York state in winter stretches white in every direction, cast blue above the frozen lake. A little house grows larger, and Hannibal’s breath a little slower.

“Are you certain?” he asks.

Will’s smile pulls up the corners of his eyes, and he turns his head to look at Hannibal before reaching out and taking his hand. He brings it to his lips to kiss, knuckle after knuckle, fingertip after fingertip, and that’s his answer.

The road curves a little, not unlike the path to Will’s home, before they pull up behind a large truck, fishing gear covered in a tarp and a dusting of snow in the open bed. Will turns to Hannibal and nuzzles against him, entirely fond, entirely loving, and presses a kiss to his throat, to his cheek.

“Come on,” he whispers, and climbs out of the car first.

Hannibal can deny Will nothing.

Seven hours of sitting aches in Hannibal as his freshly shined shoes crunch against snow. His clothes altered to account for the weight lost during his time abroad now sit sleek against his frame, a tame tan sweater above a collared shirt, tawny suit-coat and slacks. For a moment, he feels overdressed, in comparison to Will’s plaid flannel and utilitarian pants. In that same moment, he feels underdressed for the weight of the occasion.

“Hannibal!” Will calls to him, softly, smiling as their eyes meet. Hannibal follows.

Always.

Years and years and years.

The door to the house opens and more dogs rush out. Older, these, softer in their movements, but Hannibal still cannot help but smile seeing them, seeing Will drop to his knees, uncaring for the snow, to welcome wet tongues and cold feet against his chest and face.

Hannibal follows a few steps behind, reaches out for the curious animals to sniff his hands, to come and nuzzle against his legs. Will smiles, watches him interact with the creatures who are as close to his heart as the man who now softly murmurs to them.

“Will!”

The man on the porch is balding, what hair is left is salt and pepper grey. He is cleanshaven and has glasses like those Will had chosen for himself in Thailand, and a smile Hannibal knows all too well. As Will stands and steps forward, Hannibal remains rooted, panic within him, the dogs whining softly for attention he no longer pays them.

This is the man Hannibal had kept Will from, this is the man who ached and feared and spent sleepless nights waiting for his son. This is the man who should hate him, who should tell him to not set foot in his home, not contaminate it with his lack of morals and history.

Hannibal blinks when Will calls his name again, by the porch, now, his father next to him, and Hannibal goes to them, one step after another, easy as any other path to follow, and yet…

“Dad,” Will smiles, watching Hannibal approach, watching his father take him in. “This is the man who saved my life.”

There is a moment, as Hannibal stops, close to them both, heart in his throat and Will’s words in his ears. A moment when he holds out his hand where he panics it will not be taken.

And then it is, with both of John Graham’s warm palms, and he steps close enough to pull Hannibal into an embrace, holding him as he holds Will, not letting go until, with a nervous laugh, Hannibal hugs him back. When they part, Hannibal can barely look John in the eye, and John seems to care little for the fact that his eyes are brimming over. He is smiling.

“Welcome home,” he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With extraordinary thanks to [Noodle](http://noodletheelephant.tumblr.com/) for exceptional beta-reading, to [GulliverJ](http://brokenponiesmendedteacups.tumblr.com/) for inspiring us to write beyond our comfort zones and always having faith in us, and to everyone who has read, shared, kudos'd, commented, and enjoyed. Thank you, thank you, thank you.


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